Medical coding for physician practices workbook answers
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2024.05.19 09:20 zlaxy On this day 116 years ago, Nikolay Pilchikov, a scientist-physicist, developer of radio-controlled devices, died in Kharkov from a shot in the heart
 | On this day 116 years ago in Kharkov Nikolay Dmitrievich Pilchikov – scientist-physicist, inventor in the field of radio engineering, author of works on optics, terrestrial magnetism, electrical and radio engineering, radioactivity, X-rays, electrochemistry, geophysics, meteorology – was shot in the heart. submitted by zlaxy to ThisDayInHistory [link] [comments] At about seven o’clock in the morning of 6 May 1908, a shot rang out in a ward of an expensive Kharkov hospital. Breaking open the door locked from the inside, the doctors saw its only patient – it seemed that his life had been cut short in his sleep. The man was lying in his bunk, as if he hadn’t woken up yet. And if not for the bloodstain on his chest, no one would have realised the tragedy. A revolver lay on the tea-table beside the bed. It was from this revolver that the bullet that had pierced the scientist’s heart had been fired. Could a man who was undergoing medical treatment have carefully placed the gun beside his tea glass and folded his arms across his chest after shooting himself at point-blank range? Nevertheless, the “cadaver book” records ruled the death a suicide. For some reason forensic experts did not do dactyloscopy – the investigation was not puzzled by fingerprints on the black “bulldog”, which became the murder weapon. And the authoritative professor Nikolai Bokarius, whose name now bears the local Institute of Forensic Medicine, even described Pilchikova’s case in a textbook for lawyers and doctors as an example of temporary purposeful capacity of suicides with fatal gunshot wounds in the heart area. At that, the luminary recommended to take into account not only anatomical features of the injury, but also the functional state of the central nervous system. The picture was completed by the conclusion of pathologists, who found in the killed after the autopsy of the corpse modifications in the structure of the brain. A purely “police” justification for not considering the murder version was the fact that the incident took place in a locked room on the first floor (as if this could be an obstacle to unauthorised entry). And a week after the scientist’s death, on 13 May 1908, the head of the police department received a report from the head of the Kharkov security service about the unreliability of the “extreme leftist” Professor Pilchikov, who was known for his active participation in “criminal agitation activities of engineering students”. This was confirmed by a search of the scientist’s house, during which propaganda literature from the period of the first Russian revolution of 1905 was found. What was Professor Pilchikov doing before he was “worked out” by the police? The scientific fate of Nikolai Dmitrievich was as unusual as his death was mysterious and the fate of outstanding discoveries inexplicable. The scientist, whose life was cut short at the age of 51, was not only a physicist, but also a lyricist: he was no less talented in composing poetry, painting pictures and playing the violin. But he considered his life’s work to be his scientific career, which was unusually successful. The son of a public and cultural figure, who was a friend of Taras Shevchenko, was born on 9 May 1857 in Poltava, and already during his studies in gymnasium showed remarkable abilities in exact sciences. Entering the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Kharkiv University, he experimented in new at that time experiments in the field of sound recording, while still a student invented an electric phonograph. After graduation, the graduate was left to work at the Department of Physics. His first scientific monograph was devoted to optical analysis. Later the scientist made a number of discoveries on the topics of scattered light polarisation and atmospheric ionisation, atmospheric electricity and geomagnetism, radioactivity and X-rays. Pilchikov was awarded the Silver Medal from the Russian Geographical Society for a series of studies of the Kursk Magnetic Anomaly, during which iron ore deposits near Prokhorovka were predicted. After defending his thesis at the University of St. Petersburg, the master of physics was appointed privat-docent of the Kharkov University, and two years later he went to practice at a magnetic observatory in Paris, where he discovered flaws in the design of the seismograph and offered his mentors a way to correct them. Soon the young professor of Kharkov University becomes famous outside Russia, becoming a regular at international scientific conferences and a member of the Toulouse Academy of Sciences. Nikolay Pilchikov returned to Kharkov as a university professor, where he created a meteorological station that still exists today. To study the upper atmosphere, the professor developed a stratostat and then a high-altitude spacesuit to equip the pilot. The atmospheric optics researcher created his own seismograph and designed equipment to determine magnetic pressure. Having moved for some time to Odessa (to work at the Imperial Novorossiysk University), in 1894 the scientist invented an original lamp for the study of X-rays, called “Pilchikov’s focus tube”. The optical and galvanic version of the study of electrolysis developed by him made it possible to obtain images on metal plates – so the inventor became the author of electrophotography or photogalvanography. And on 25 March 1898, Nikolai Pilchikov demonstrated for the first time a device working with radio waves of a certain length and rejecting interference. During his experiments in Odessa he lit a lighthouse with the help of radio waves and moved a railway semaphore, blew up a yacht and made a cannon fire. The scientist characterised his contribution to radio physics as follows: while Popov and Marconi were looking for a way to transmit a signal over the greatest possible distance, he was solving the problem of cutting off wireless power transmission from extraneous electrical waves. Thus appeared the first device with a protector – a security filter, allowing only the waves addressed to it to reach the mechanism and protecting the equipment from atmospheric and radio interference. The scientist not only designed and manufactured different types of the first protectors, but also tested them in practice. With the help of his revolutionary device, Professor Pilchikov made it possible to create radio-controlled mine boats that could sink enemy ships without a crew and fire on enemy targets. In proposing the idea to the Russian military, the inventor characterised it as a way of detonating objects at a considerable distance without cables or other visible communication. Applying for financial assistance from the military department, Pilchikov planned to spend 15,000 roubles on laboratory equipment, manufacture of devices and their testing with the support of the Sevastopol naval forces. For his part, the scientist undertook to keep the know-how in strict secrecy and not to publish any information about the development in scientific literature. As a result, this circumstance may have contributed to the fact that the scientist’s works disappeared and he himself may have been eliminated. Military engineers discussed the professor’s petition for research funds with reference to foreign experience. Specialists compared Pilchikov’s achievements with the developments of foreign scientists experimenting with wireless telegraph, to whom the authorities did not refuse anything. For example, Preece was authorised for experiments by the postal department of England, Marconi obtained in 1897 large sums of money from the naval department of Italy, and the Berlin scientist Slaby received aeronautical parks, watercraft and troops of the Potsdam garrison from the Emperor of Germany. Pilchikov, on the other hand, had a much more extensive programme and was naturally expected to produce the most ambitious results. On his return to Kharkov in 1902, the professor continued his research in the best-equipped physical laboratory of those times, the local University of Technology. He was also allocated a ship “Dnestr” and funds for marine experiments. On the ship in 1903 the scientist equipped a receiving radio station, and on the Chersonese lighthouse – transmitting. Alas, neither the scheme of those protectors, nor the content of the experiments, nor their further fate are known today. In the archives we found only information about a letter of gratitude to Professor Pilchikov from the Commander of the Pacific Fleet. It was dated the beginning of September 1904. It is clear that in the midst of the war with Japan secret military developments could be of interest to both belligerents. Moreover, other external enemies were also interested in preventing Russia’s military advantage. Professor Pilchikov’s research competed with American experiments in the Maritime Ministry under Tesla, who was also working on the task of wireless control of a minelayer from the shore. This is a case in science when “an idea is in the air” and the same discovery is independently made by scientists at different ends of the world. It is believed that the first radio-controlled telemechanical system in the world was developed by Nikola Tesla – he patented and presented an unprecedented ship model in the summer of 1898, but came to the discovery the day before, in spring. And “Russian Tesla” Nikolai Pilchikov tested a similar invention in March of the same year, which was reported in a note in the “Odessa Review”, which for some reason remained unnoticed by the scientific community. The “two Nicholas” had a lot in common, despite the fact that they lived and created on different continents. Scientists were almost the same age. Both had no family – neither wives nor close relatives. Both were undividedly attracted to physical science – the mysteries of radioactivity, X-rays and lightning. But to Pilchikov did not appear one day George Westinghouse with a million dollars for four dozen patents. And an understanding friend, as Tesla had in the person of Katharine Johnson, next to Nikolay Dmitrievich was not there either… Being left without further state support, Pilchikov could not complete the work on his wireless protector. In 1905 he left to observe the solar eclipse in Algeria, from where he returned with failing health. Ill-health was aggravated by an acute feeling of loneliness. 1908 was a fateful year in the fate of the scientist. It was the best time of the year, the beginning of May, a time of intoxication with life and romantic dreams. But for Pilchikov, the “delight of nature” had no inspiring meaning: five days before his own birthday, he went to a psychoneurological clinic. And it happened under very mysterious circumstances. According to police reports, the owner of a private hospital and a well-known doctor I. Y. Platonov received a call from an unknown man on 3 May with a request to hospitalise Nikolai Dmitrievich Pilchikov. It was asked to prepare a separate room where the patient would be alone. When the professor appeared in the clinic, the doctors saw nothing critical in his condition. He was elegantly dressed, and in his hands held a suitcase with papers. Two days later, a shot rang out in the ward, and the papers were gone. Not a single piece of his war work was found among his household belongings. The blueprints of inventions of world importance, which the scientist had not even had time to patent, disappeared. Wasn’t the murder then the final fat point in the planned operation? And didn’t the inventor-physicist take with him to the ward what the special services hunting for his military developments were tracking down? Perhaps it was in the hospital that Nikolai Pilchikov, who had a premonition of trouble, tried to hide from his threatening pursuers? Or maybe they put him there so that it would be easier to realise what they had planned? And who were these mysterious killers?.. We will probably never get answers to these questions. But it is known how the brilliant ideas of the tragically departed scientist were put into practice. In 1913, the first radio-controlled aeroplane took to the skies. Four years later, a German boat controlled from a plane blew up the quay in the English harbour of Newport. In the same year, 1917, a German ship was damaged by a British minelayer guided from a radio-controlled aeroplane. In 1925 the first mine without wires appeared. And in 1943 the Soviet troops destroyed the Nazi headquarters with General von Braun in Kharkov occupied by the enemy by controlled explosion from Voronezh. Radio warfare has long been supplemented by radio defence, where the first role is played by devices like Pilchikov’s protectors. Thanks to radio defence, in 1944 the British were invulnerable to German fighters in the Libyan desert. Radio locks of increased complexity are used in satellite navigation and launching systems for space and military rockets. And all responsible radio electronic equipment is protected from interference by modern devices working on the principle of Professor Pilchikov’s protector – the “Russian Tesla”, who became a hindrance to someone himself… Source: Vyacheslav Kapreljants |
2024.05.19 09:13 SnooDrawings8632 Understanding Roles and Responsibilities of each person in your case. How does the injured worker know where to get the correct information? What to do with contradictory information? What if the person you're supposed to talk to is unresponsive?
Besides the questions in the title I tired to elaborate a little and also each question(s) has two, a. and b. sections. Section a. is meant for sort of a broad understanding. Section b. is my personal, specific case example (active claim, CA ~10 months).
I'm sure who you'll see will depend on state law, your injury, among other things. Regardless of who you see, more importantly: How do we (the injured worker) know if who we've been assigned to is doing their job correctly or just having an off day, since we know it's not required to have good bedside manner, what are they required by definition AND law? That said:
Ending note: There is so many more examples I could give which to me paint a picture of neglect. From what I can tell, I either already signed my rights away or it's just not worth the fight. I don't even want to fight, or believed there would be a reason for a disagreement due to my injury but since that bubble of disillusionment has popped, how can I reproach getting the best medical treatment. I was lead to believe that after seeing a specialist I would have the option to get a second opinion before the QME. I haven't even seen the first specialist (I was sent to an office with a specialist in it, but the person I saw was just a family practitioner).and since both my doctor and my adjutor are not helping ---Who the fuck do I talk to?
submitted by SnooDrawings8632 to WorkersComp [link] [comments]
I'm sure who you'll see will depend on state law, your injury, among other things. Regardless of who you see, more importantly: How do we (the injured worker) know if who we've been assigned to is doing their job correctly or just having an off day, since we know it's not required to have good bedside manner, what are they required by definition AND law? That said:
1a. Despite case by case variations; who are personnel that everyone will see no matter what? What should you expect from them, and is there more they can do...but only if you know how to ask? I'm imagining a knowledgeable answer would be a long list of all the possible outcomes within the maximum allowed in WC, but probably more helpful is to address the most common. A small list may only include a companies HR, Claims adjustor, and an Occupational Health doctor for example. Then continuing the list after those essential people is there typically a usual process where if once your case goes for a certain amount of time or ______ happens, you could expect to meet these ______ job title? I'm hoping to help other people at least have an idea of what to expect out of said people.
1b. TLDR: Here's one of the biggest examples of not knowing who to talk to and whether that information is correct. I have not been given crucial test results from 3 months ago. Original test (Neuropathy) doc said to get my results from my doctor, who sends me to therapist, who sends me back to doctor, my adjustor says doctor, doctor sends me to "Specialist", turns out not specialist, who sends me back to my doctor...ummmm....WTF do I do at my next doctors visits in a few days??
1b (cont.) It has come to my attention that I'm completely unaware of exactly what a large majority of the people I've been assigned to see do. In fact, in what capacity do I "have to see them"? Can I request a swap, or how do I make a complaint? I have been MORE than patient, and I've given the benefit of the doubt for so long that I can no longer accept being passed along. I'm already back where I started, for the 3rd time. Uh...so, besides just wanting information for myself, I'd think the test results should help me heal. I've been denied more treatments (Appeal's denied too) where I'd think that those test results could play a crucial role. Where once I thought there has there been a miscommunication, now feels like I'm in an echo chamber, or worse. This is quite alarming as it also shines light into the fact that I am also unaware of how "my doctor" can best help me, if at all. "My doctor", the one I'm required to see at Occupational Health, (I'm told I not allowed to see my family doctor) doesn't seem to do anything other than fill out the "Return to work form". Is that correct? How would I know?? They seem to just write whatever I tell them. Similarly the same goes for what treatments I've gotten. Best I can tell, there is no indication they have reviewed any of the information from other doctors and therapists. It's now going on 3 months where I haven't been given test results.
Unfortunately it's not just my doctor who I'm not getting information from. "Generic Adjustor" Enters the chat. or maybe not, because to top off the confusion, I can't get ahold of my adjustor who so far been the one steering me into the .... direction. Unfortunately I believe I'm waking up too late. I've called multiple times a day for a week straight while leaving messages and follow up emails noting that I've called. They do respond to email, which usually consists of one line stating something like "call anytime, I'll be in the office all week".. Funny thing is I'm not sure what exactly they are even supposed to do or bare minimum required to do. Even when I get ahold of them, I'm questioning if I can even trust them. I'm not saying "it's conspiracy". However due to the most recent info I've gotten, I do think the run around could be very deliberate play. How do I know if they're simply bad at their job or leaving me in the dark. It sure feels like it's purposeful. This all came to a head when after reviewing our last few emails, I see a pattern where they only respond to some of the questions, and even have given verifiably incorrect, contradictory information. How do I check these facts? Should I talk to a supervisor? Is there a system to check and balance these things? Who do I talk to? It all came to a head when I opened mail to find: Request of QME with the reason being "Objection to Primary Treating Physician's determination regarding temporary disability, permanent disability, or the need for future medical care." Aggravating but I'm sure they followed the (rules I was unaware of) book. It's questions like this that have me really, really upset: What is even meant by "Objection to Primary Treating Physician's determination"? 1. Quick sidebar - is that decision made by the "my doctor" that I described earlier - or the "Provider"? > Meaning, those two terms have been used interchangeably, and I fear that, and why I used quotes for "my doctor" earlier, I'm wondering if this other name (who happens to be another doctor at the Occupational Health office) a person I have never met let alone seen is the one calling the shots. Either way I'm pretty worried. 2. Here is another example which shows only a part of the circle of "who do I talk to". Here is a quote from my adjustor 10 days after the letter had been officiated, but before I got it states "you have not seen a specialist, attended a QME, or have a clear treatment plan defined by your primary treating physician.". Am I wrong to have read that to believe I'd still be seeing a specialist? Doesn't it read that the information the specialist decides would be what determines the next step? Isn't it safe to say that by month 10 I'd have a treatment plan --of course unless your not privy to your own test results?Ending note: There is so many more examples I could give which to me paint a picture of neglect. From what I can tell, I either already signed my rights away or it's just not worth the fight. I don't even want to fight, or believed there would be a reason for a disagreement due to my injury but since that bubble of disillusionment has popped, how can I reproach getting the best medical treatment. I was lead to believe that after seeing a specialist I would have the option to get a second opinion before the QME. I haven't even seen the first specialist (I was sent to an office with a specialist in it, but the person I saw was just a family practitioner).and since both my doctor and my adjutor are not helping ---Who the fuck do I talk to?
2024.05.19 08:35 Heroman3003 Taking Care of Broken Birds [Part 3]
More misery bird? More misery bird. Really miserymaxxing with these fics I have going, but hey, this one is not that miserable actually! Krekos is back and ready to be dense and downcast, but maybe not quite miserable? Read and see!
Big thank you to NoP community for being great and supportive of my endeavors!
Also, obviously, big thanks to SpacePaladin15 for creating this universe and allowing fanfiction well to flow free!
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Memory transcription subject: Krekos, Krakotl Refugee
Date [standardized human time]: May 6th, 2137
I stare at the foul creature before me. Normally staring at something directly head on like that would be too predatory for me to do, but after nearly dying of bread yesterday, I didn’t feel patient enough to be gentle. The creature stared right back, though in a much more natural, prey-like way, tilting its head slightly as it looked back at me with one eye and let out a long bwok.
“Are you doing this now? Really?”, I ask, knowing full well it cannot respond.
Well, it can, if another bwok it made is any indication. Of course, translators aren’t yet advanced enough to translate non-sapient speech, but the intention behind sound is intuitively clear. It’s telling me to back off. Well, I tried the diplomatic approach at least.
Raising my wing I begin sliding the bird out of its nest, careful to keep any delicate joints out of its reach. It started clucking in upset indignation, struggling back and even trying to peck at me, but after realizing that I will not relent, it hopped out of the box and rushed out of the cattle house, revealing a single dead egg in the nesting box.
With relief, I finally pick up the last egg and head back to leave them at the house. Turns out that while Reginald didn’t forget to both lock them up yesterday and let them out today, he did neglect feeding them both times, as well as collecting the harvest. So when I was driven back here in early morning, the first thing I did was making sure they were taken care of. I can’t say the horrid birds looked in any way hungry, but the moment I poured the feeding grain for them, they attacked it with more viciousness than I’d expect of an actual predator. And yet only thirteen were present at the feeding, as the one that’s usually the target of flock’s ire remained in the cattle house yet again, Reginald leaving it to it, being unaware of its undesirable habit of trying to hatch dead eggs.
With eggs delivered, I flew my way to my usual spot atop the cattle house and could finally relax. The loner beast first made its way to feast on the scraps of the grain that other birds already all have had their fill of, so I wasn’t too concerned. Instead I tried to reflect on the morning I had so far.
Waking up at the hospital did make me momentarily panic before I remembered the precluding events. Not that I could properly panic, feeling the most starved I’ve been my whole life, and too weak to try flying out of the window. Thankfully, the breakfast they provided was actually well made with krakotl needs in mind, algae soup alongside a few slices of bread, this time without any horrid human ideas like putting eggs in there. Eggs! Turns out they put eggs in some kinds of bread! That’s how I got sick! Eggs! The thought of what I consumed even now made me queasy, and it definitely made breakfast a much less appetizing affair than it would have been without that knowledge, but back then the hunger won over the disgust.
Lena did keep her promise and came to pick me up extra early. Her being a staff member at the hospital gave her some extra privilege, I assume, hence why I was released without any forms needing to be filled out personally. She did have important business today too, which probably explained the earlyness and urgency of her driving me back to her house.
That did not mean I escaped her ire, however. While I couldn’t pinpoint anything to identify the man, as Bob was apparently a common name, that offered me bread, we did come to understanding that he was likely either unaware of the nutritional contents of it, or of extent to which the Cure-induced allergy would be affecting a krakotl. Yet, Lena seemed much angrier at me for failing to take any precautions. Turns out that was the purpose of medicinal injectors, epipens as humans call them, that were provided to me. I was supposed to have them on me in case I accidentally ingested contaminated food. Nobody told me that, I was just handed them back when I first received the necessities at the refugee camp and I had no clue what they were for. Then she also berated me for eating random food from strangers and ignoring bad flavors. Turns out that brioche bread isn’t actually bitter at all, and that was my body reacting to an allergen in it. Reaction that I unwisely elected to ignore, to further ire of my host. By the end, several new rules of my stay here were made, including not eating things I don’t know and always having at least one epipen on me. Thankfully, these rules would be ones I’d start following even without them being established, so I won’t have to concern myself with being kicked out over accidentally breaking them.
As if following the rules will be enough to make them like you.
Trying to distract myself from thoughts of yesterday’s incident, I focused my attention on the flock. All birds accounted for, so at least I knew that my absence did not result in the predator coming to snatch one of them. I do not wish to insult my hosts, but Reginald is far from most attentive people in matters unrelated to his job, and I am not sure the birds were watched at all while I was out. Speaking of, my scannings of surrounding treelines revealed no sign of the predator today. Perhaps it departed to hunt elsewhere, or maybe it ventured too close to a more populated area and exterminators dealt with it.
Actually, did human exterminators work similar to Federation ones? I knew for a fact they had them, although they seemed like a market of private organizations if advertisements are anything to judge by. Still, what methods do they use? I know humans oppose fire, and do not believe in predatory taint, but surely they have measures to protect themselves? They are, by self-admission, far from the best natural predator, and I doubt Earth’s non-sapient predators would just leave humans be. Maybe I should call one of those human exterminator agencies and call them in to deal with that predator? I haven’t told Lena or Reginald about it, as I didn’t want to bother them, but it could pose a serious threat to the cattle, but maybe that’s the way I could resolve it without involving them?
I have not done nearly as much research into human culture and lifestyle as I should have, considering that I’ve lived on Earth for over half a year now, but the sheer width of the topic always overwhelmed me the moment I opened internet search app to the point where I just closed it right away.
And you expect to start studying again with that attitude? You’ll flunk out even from this primitive predator education course.
Extra loud call from the flock made me refocus my attention on them, but it was nothing. Just the loner getting pecked extra hard and lashing out against assailants, causing a small aimless stampede as all the birds ran around in circles, puffing up at one another. The assailants now looked a lot more like victims. I could understand those birds more than I could humans at least. The loner bird is clearly an odd one out. It’s the only one repeatedly trying to hatch unfertilized eggs it lays, and it seems to always avoid the rest of the flock. Humans may deny the existence of Predator Disease, but they can’t deny that prey and predator both can and will sometimes behave in unnatural ways that may threaten the herd's safety. Or pack’s, in case of humans. Birds must know on instinctual level that the loner’s behavior is unnatural and are attempting to combat the Predator Disease on instinctual level. And since that is natural, I still will not interfere in this, unless the loner bird actually becomes a threat to others or will start getting too injured. The first time I attempted to pick one of the birds up was the only time for a good reason, as I have learned their viciousness all too well.
DING-DING
The sudden loud ring startled me enough that I nearly tumbled off the roof. Who would be coming over now? Lena and Reginald have left together and shouldn’t be back until afternoon, and they’d never use the bell. That means someone must be here for them. But wouldn’t they warn anyone to not come over? Especially with their plans for today.
With nobody to answer these questions, I had no choice but to go and discover the answer myself, flying up and over the house, towards the entrance gate. The moment I passed the house roof, I already saw a familiar silhouette. It was the human child from a few days ago.
Thankfully, Lena’s insistence on me carrying an epipen at all times meant I also carried my satchel at all times too, so I didn’t have to go grabbing my holopad, and took it out. But before I could even launch the translator TTS app to type out a greeting, the child was already hopping in place with excitement.
“Mr. Krekos! Hi! I came over to visit!”, she exclaimed, showing off her teeth in an unnerving expression of human joy. I simply tried to avoid that and focused on the pad, typing out my response.
“Hello, Rosie. Why are you here?”
The question was genuine, as the child was not carrying any more of that honey substance from last time.
“I just came over to visit you! Is that okay? Are Mr. and Ms. Vince okay with it?”
Visit... me? Why? While I was confused, I did instinctively type out a reply.
“They did tell me visitors are allowed as long as there’s no trouble when I first moved in.”
And before I could type a followup message asking her why she’s here, she already let out a joyous roar and ran past me.
“Can I see the chickens?”, she asked, and not waiting for an answer, rushed past the house and towards the cattle yard.
“Wait! You’ll scare them!”, I yell after her, but of course without a translator she can’t understand me as she runs like she already knows where to go.
And indeed she has, quickly rushing up to the open field where the birds were grazing. Thankfully she didn’t start chasing them, instead just approaching the flock from a distance and swaying in place, watching them with what I assume was some sort of predatory excitement at the sight of prey. Maybe that’s where the contained hunting instinct of human children showed themselves? In chasing small birds? I was still more subdued, considering she stopped shy of causing a small stampede, but still.
“Grandpa used to take me with him! He helped watch this farm until Mr. and Ms. Vince moved in. I like chickens! I think they’re cute.”, the child told me innocently as she kept swaying and watching as the beasts grazed upon insects of the pasture.
That revelation was... interesting. I suppose it makes sense that between the original owner of this land dying in the bombings and Lena and Reginald moving in, it would be unattended. With nobody to feed and watch over those things, they would be long dead for sure. And it was Rosie’s grandfather... Speaking of. I typed out my words.
“Does your grandfather know you’re here?”
She seemed to get a weird look as she stopped her excited swaying, fiddling with her hands instead. Looks like I asked the correct question.
“...he knows I am out visiting neighbors.”
That did not answer my question. I squinted at the human child, and she dipped her head as she continued.
“...he doesn’t know I’m here specifically. Or that an alien even lives here...”, she explained, her tone suddenly more sullen.
I couldn’t help but squint at that, and it appears that my expression was readable enough that even a human could see the suspicion, as she continued.
“I’m sorry... But if I told grandpa, he’d tell me I’m forbidden from talking to you, like he forbade me from talking to hedgehog people in town... But I want to talk to you! You’re nice and you’re a space bird!”
The child was actually working around the rules established by her guardian to come see me. I don’t know if I should be glad or concerned. Clearly, the man is anti-alien in his opinions, and I’d rather that kind of man not know about how close he lives to one. At the same time, I’d rather not encourage a child for lying to their guardian in order to meet a stranger they know they aren’t allowed to interact with... So I just took the middle path with my next message.
“I see. What did you want to talk to me about then?”, TTS speaks for me.
Her stiffened body language disappears, replaced again with earlier excitement.
“I wanna know more about space! And aliens! It’s all so cool but grandpa says it’s all dangerous because mom and dad died. But it’s not! The hedgehog people were nice, and you’re nice too!”
I wasn’t sure about that logic, but my self-preservation told me I shouldn’t try convincing her to go confessing. Instead I focused more on her chosen topic.
“I am not sure I am the best person to ask about space. I am not a scientist or traveler.”
“But you’re from there! You know way more than me. I don’t even know what you are called. And there’s gotta be cool things out in space!”
I let out a sigh. I suppose it’s childlike curiosity at its finest. So unfamiliar with mundane that it is a wonder. I remember being like that about becoming a doctor.
And then you let your teacher die.
I quickly tapped on the pad.
“Okay, I can answer questions, but I may not know everything.”
The noise that came out of the girl was like a squeal of a panicked dossur as she started hopping and spinning in place.
“Yes! Yes! Thank you, Mr. Krekos!” Sudden movement did cause me to recoil a bit, which in turn caused her to cease her happy flailing and adjust her little dress. “I dunno where to start though... Hm... What are you?”
...for all my trepidation about not knowing answers, I should have anticipated that the questions she asks will be rather age-appropriate and on the same level as we learn in our first school classes. At least I won’t disappoint her then.
“I am from a species called ‘krakotl’. We’re avians, as is obvious. Our home is...”dead, gone, reduced to glass and ash by our own hubris “...was Nishtal. A beautiful planet...”
Thankfully she did not question my hesitant pause. Instead she just nodded along.
“What about the hedgehog people? I already know venlil, but they’re the only ones I know name of.”
Hedgehog people in town she mentioned earlier. The only species I could think of that could be seen there would be the gojid. I have no clue what hedgehogs are, but probably some creature with visible similarity to them.
“They are called ‘gojid’, and they’re from gojid Cradle. Both of our species are... well, used to be known for our might and protecting other species of Federation.”
I am not sure if that’s something to brag about, considering... everything. But I didn’t want this child to get brought down with depressing regrets of our species. Let her know something nicer instead. She clearly lost a lot, but there’s still joy left in her. I wouldn’t want to be the one to ruin that.
“Cool! What about other people? I wanna know more!”
And so I went on, telling her about various species, although I mostly focused on ones in this new human-led union, only mentioning kolshians and farsul beyond that. It’s weird explaining to a child what a tilfish or a harchen looks like, but thankfully my holopad isn’t just a method of communicating with implant-less children. With access to interstellar web, I could easily pull up pictures of various alien species to show to her, even if she struggled to believe that some of them were even sapient purely based off of looks. With how varied species in Federation are, and how some of us admittedly aren’t too far physiologically from our more primal ancestors.
Among other topics, she asked me to tell her interesting things, which I didn’t know much of. I told her about Venlil Prime’s tidally locked status, a rarity among habitable planets, much less homeworlds for species. I told her about the unique architecture of Mileau, designed to accommodate both species of regular size and dossur themselves. I told her about Colia medical academies, some of the most beautiful medical facilities in the galaxy.
I wish I was more well-travelled, but I just wasn’t. My whole life, I never left Nishtal until the extermination fleet took me despite my protests. That may have been what saved my life...
Not that I, of all people, deserved it...
“Hey! Stop that!”
I flinched as I heard the child yell, but quickly realized that it wasn’t directed at me. Instead, Rosie was rushing down towards the chicken flock, breaking up the fight in which the loner was being pecked by a few larger chickens. As the human child approached, the birds stopped their infighting and scattered in different directions, crowing in loud panic and discontent. On instinct, I found myself rushing towards the child, forgetting about translation entirely.
“What are you doing?! Don’t touch them!”
I didn’t want her to hurt the cattle accidentally, and I didn’t want her to get hurt by the angry birds in return. But, it seems like the moment the birds scattered, she was satisfied with her actions and turned back to me, wearing another one of her happy smiles.
“Sorry, Mr. Krekos, I just saw chickens being mean. Bad chickens.” She explained.
I was baffled. Why would she interfere like that? When I tried that back when I was just starting, that got me pecked! But with her, the birds just scattered. What if they pecked her?
I took the pad out again and started typing quickly.
“That was dangerous. Why did you do that? What if they attacked you? Why are you even interfering in their natural dynamics?”, questions flowed out of my pad with an artificial human voice.
The girl simply giggled.
“They’re chickens! They aren’t dangerous. They don’t peck that painful and I’ve been scratched worse before. And I have to stop it because bullying is wrong.”
Then she actually noticed that the one that was being attacked wandered close. She casually approached it from behind, the blind spot and just reached down and grabbed it, picking the bird up. I was ready to rush to help the bird when...
“Mwah! There, all better.”
She did a human ‘kiss’ on the back of the cattle bird’s neck before releasing it, the surprise of it causing it to rush off. I knew what kisses were, I’ve seen enough of them between Lena and Reginald, but I believed they were gestures of intimate affection, not... what was even that?
It seems Rosie noticed my confusion as she explained.
“You gotta kiss it so it heals better! That’s what mom taught me.” The child displayed that smile of hers shamelessly. With how much I was being exposed to it, it almost wasn’t unnerving anymore. Still, it was interesting to learn that kisses are seen as something that helps wounds. I guess some species do have saliva with mild antiseptic properties, wouldn’t be too out there to assume humans are the same. And if that’s the case, maybe that’s how the kissing tradition started? Exchange of protective fluid between lovers?
“I see. I did not know that.” I responded before letting my puffed feathers relax. Okay, this whole ‘watching a human child’ thing is turning out to somehow be even more stressful than I expected at first.
“Wait, Mr. Krekos, what time is it?” She suddenly asked, looking up at the sky.
“It’s nearly twelve.” I respond, holopad having a convenient clock for local time.
“Oh no! I need to be home soon! Was nice seeing you Mr. Krekos gotta go bye!”
Before I had even a chance at typing out an answer or my own goodbye, the child sprinted away and back towards the entrance. I had to take flight just to keep up, and even then she just turned around, waved her arm at me and then kept sprinting down the road after leaving the gate. I simply offered a small wave of a wing back before locking the gate again. I suppose it is hard to keep track of time without a device or clock nearby...
Well, at least I had the usual peace and quiet now. And learned a bit more about the creatures I was in charge of. I should really try to deal with my aversion to looking things up on the human internet...
Just as I was about to head back out towards the yard, I heard a loud car horn, a familiar one, getting my attention. Lena’s car. There they were, signaling me, probably having spotted me at the gate from afar. Deciding to make use of my presence here, and hoping to avoid needing to explain that I had a surprise visitor earlier, I went ahead and opened the large gate, allowing the car to enter.
Once it was parked in the usual space, the doors opened and three people came out. Lena and Reginald were both looking a bit disheveled, but their faces carried these smiles that seemed wider than ever before. And third person... Was a stranger. A human I knew of, but never actually met. As he exited the car, a large bag in one hand, he just stared at me, standing in the front yard...
“...okay, I expected many things when I was told you guys housed a refugee, but not this.”
Oh no. Oh no, he was not one of the ones that was willing to overlook an invader that partook in bombing of his planet being allowed to walk free, of course, Lena and Reginald were the weird ones like that, doesn’t mean their son won’t be... I felt the panic rising as I realized I’d need to return to the camp. Why was I upset about that? This was supposed to just have been a way to make money, but now I have a free education program. Do I need to stay? No, but... Why?! Why do I not want to leave?
“Ken, you said it’s going to be alright no matter what it is, right? Wanted us to keep it a surprise to meet a new friend?” Lena’s voice. She should have told him, that’d give me time to prepare why didn’t they give me time why.
“No, no problems, just, really surprised, that’s all... uh... hey, buddy, you okay? You’re really... trembly.”
He was approaching me, and instinct took over as I recoiled, before stuttering out my answer.
“I-I’m fine...”
...thankfully translators don’t translate voice cracks. I hope, at least...
“Hey, relax... I have no problem with you being a krakotl, I just didn’t think...” He looks over at Lena and Reginald. “Calm down... I can wear my visor if you want?”
Right. Those things humans use to hide their scary faces from us.
“I... I’m good...”
Why would it last? It almost felt good after all.
There was some emotion I struggled to read on the young human’s face, as he sighed and shook his head.
“I screwed this up, I’m sorry. Let... Let me try again.” He straightened out, and adjusted his clothing, before slowly approaching me and giving me a small smile, no teeth showing. “Hello. My name is Kenneth Vince and I'm son of Lena and Reginald Vince. I was told you’re a refugee they took in to help out. It’s nice to meet you. What’s your name?”
That... snapped me out of it. Right... He was... not upset at my existence. He was just very surprised that Lena and Reginald weren’t. That’s a reasonable thing to be surprised about, considering I was surprised about it to this day. I tried to compose myself as I responded.
“My name is Krekos. I live here as... hired help with the cattle. It’s... nice to meet you?”
The smile on Kenneth’s face widens, though he still refrains from showing his teeth. Instead, he extends a hand towards me. A handshake is a human gesture that I found far from comfortable, but I didn’t want to give him a reason to change his mind on acceptability of my existence, so I took it with a wingclaw. He gently took it and held for a few seconds before letting go and sighing again, turning to his parents.
“You know, I always thought you guys would be empty nesters, but I never thought it’d be that literal.”
That got all three of them laughing, as I just tilted my head in confusion. I was fairly sure there were no empty nests in the house until after I adjusted the attic room for my own accommodations. Still, I took the laughter as a sign that the tense moment had fully passed and let my ruffled feathers slowly rest.
“Let’s head inside. Krekos, we’re having dinner, you’re welcome to join us.” Reginald said, picking up Kenneth’s bag. I tilted my head a little and he followed up with elaboration. “We will be having meat... But there’s still going to be stuff you can eat too. It’s a celebration, so I prepared a bit of everything.”
“Dad, you shouldn’t have!” Kenneth responded with embarrassment.
“None of that! Our son returned from the war, alive and a hero, and we can have a celebration. Krekos, I know you’re still... uncertain about meat so you don’t—”
“I’ll join.”
Wait, who said that? And why did they say that in my voice?
Wait, that was me. Why did I say that?
“That’s great to hear! I’ve got some nice steamed broccoli and some vegetarian fried rice as sides that you’ll enjoy!” Reginald smiled at me and I felt myself shrinking into my feathers. That the humans didn’t notice at least, proceeding into the house instead.
Well, looks like I signed my warrant. At least my bag and my epipen were on me in case something at the table triggers the allergy again. Would be rather unfortunate to have it happen two days in a row.
And that’s how, in just ten or so minutes, I found myself sitting at the dining perch, while humans took seats in chairs, all consuming chunks of roasted flesh and somehow managing to also stuff pieces of equally roasted plants in, and converse with one another. You wouldn’t be able to tell on first look, but despite their mouths being relatively small, especially for a predator, it seems they compensate for it by having those be near bottomless in both hunger and small talk.
I am not sure how I managed to shift my focus away from them consuming animal matter in front of me, however vat grown it might have been, and onto their conversation instead, but I succeeded. I suppose that was just part of me going native around predators. Soon, I’ll be the one feasting along with them before I know it, and snacking on those epipens to not die of it.
Like you could ever be on the same level as humans.
“So, Fahl? That’s where you were sent after the Battle of Earth?” Lena asked.
“Yeah. From what I heard, we got a light posting compared to guys at Sillis or Mileau. The most I had to deal with was some exterminator insurgents.”
That’s right. Since harchen participated in the Extermination Fleet, they were one of those who were occupied by humans during the war. It makes sense that there was at least some ground resistance.
“Honestly, the worst thing out there was the heat. Not the flamethrower kind, the climate. The place was so damn dry and hot. At least exterminators you could subdue or evade. Not so much with the scorching sun!”
I couldn’t resist a small chuckle at the idea of a predator being more afraid of hot weather than flamethrowers as I slowly pecked at the vegetables on my plate. Thankfully it was set far enough aside from any meat dishes that no contamination should occur, but I was still examining pieces before putting them in my mouth just in case.
Seems like reacting was a mistake though, as that brought Kenneth’s attention onto me. He finished chewing latest piece of flesh and pointed a fork at me.
“So, Krekos... Where are you from? Cradle was my guess, but I do know there were refugees from other places like Sillis too.”
That’s a weird question. Isn’t it kind of to be expected for a krakotl to be from our actual homeworld?”
“I’m from Nishtal.”
“No, no, that’s not what I meant,” Kenneth chuckled, tossing a piece of broccoli into his mouth and swallowing before continuing, “I meant, where did you live? I kind of assumed you were born there, but it’s not like Nishtal had a chance to send refugees out, and if they did, this is the last place they’d be.”
Oh... I caught concerned looks of Lena and Reginald, looking between me and Kenneth from both sides. Not only did they not make him aware that I was a krakotl, they also neglected to mention just how I came by my refugee status... Which was just a legal workaround to grant me asylum without unnecessary complications or establishing undesirable precedent. Legally, I may be a refugee, but practically... I am a defector. Lena and Reginald know that, I told them my story before. And while they were weirdly accepting, Kenneth... Fought extermination fleet here on Earth. Personally.
Still, I wasn’t about to lie. It took a few moments and gathering mental strength to steel myself, and averting my eyes, focusing on the plate of warm vegetables in front of me rather than the human’s anticipating stare before I answered.
“I did live on Nishtal. I... I came with the extermination fleet.” I responded, doing my best to avoid looking at him. I did not want to witness his reaction, for some reason the thought of seeing it weighed heavy on my mind.
“Oh.”
The response was simple, and had no followup. There was no more clinking of cutlery against plates, or chewing. The only thing hanging in the air of the kitchen was silence, weighing down on me. It dragged on and on... until it just got so unbearable I couldn’t take it.
“I-I’m full... Thank you for the meal.” I quickly said, hopping off the perch and stepping out of the kitchen, quickly making my way to the yard and taking flight.
Fresh air of the outside and rush of it as I flew up and gained speed... I missed that. I knew it’s not safe to just fly over other people’s territory, so I corrected my course into doing large sweeping circles over the cattle yard and simply let my wings carry me.
Flying away from any danger is the only thing I’m good for anyway. The only thing I ever do.
I closed my eyes. With them closed and not focusing on my angle it feels like I’m actually flying away from all the troubles. Away from humans who barely tolerate my existence, away from gojid who see me as worse than a predator, away from Earth and all its incorrigible customs, away from horrid cattle, away from constant memories...
Flying feels nice. It may be a bit harder than it was home, but it’s still possible. I heard that on Venlil Prime or Mileau it’s much harder. But here? Just an extra flap of wings for every few paces and you’re just fine, free to soar the skies...
Alone. With no one to ever share it with me again.
Slowly I let my eyes open back to the bleak reality. Greenery of surrounding pastures and woods, bright blue skies and farmhouses dotted about here and there greeted me. I lowered my gaze down, focusing on what’s below. There they were, fourteen brown and black dots spread around the enclosed portion of the farm territory. I am not sure how much time I’ve spent flying in circles and trying to forget things but my wings were feeling a tad sore. Then as I just began slow descent, in same circular motion, I noticed that one of the birds, a familiar one, was being chased by several others. Recounting the morning, I tried putting the knowledge to action, and shifted direction of descent, swooping down. To my surprise, that actually worked, as the moment I got close to the ground, the cattle birds all got much louder and scattered in all directions, including the loner. Who, at least this time, got off unharmed. I suppose such pathetic flightless creatures would fear a flying one much more than they would when I just run up to them...
Swooping at them from the sky like a predator to intimidate them into behaving... Like an arxur warden.
With the fight preemptively broken up, I flutter up to the roof of the cattle house, to my usual position and rested my wings. I didn’t see any movement from the direction of the house, so I suppose the family is still busy unpacking. Since Kenneth joined the military just before the Battle of Earth, and Lena and Reginald only moved here after their actual house in city of New York got destroyed, it’d be the first time the human is seeing what is basically his new home. There was a room set aside for him since before I even moved in, and while there is also a guest room... That one did not have a large enough window to fit through, which did not feel comfortable. So when I asked for a space with a bigger window they only had an attic to offer. They seemed uncomfortable letting me live in a tiny room with slanted roof, but I found such space more comforting than I would have a large room with a window not large enough to fit even one fully spread wing through.
I wonder if Kenneth will need as much renovation as I did? The house is built for humans, but he never lived there before. Will he need to buy a more comfortable bed? Getting a proper nesting setup in place of a bed took a bit of effort, but I figured something out. Human sheets were comfortable enough for such, and sitting perches were thankfully not that hard to get thanks to help from the refugee administration. Maybe that’s the things that Lena went to buy yesterday? Kenneth’s preferred room decor?
I looked up to the sky to see the sun beginning to dim. I am not sure if it was me flying that long, or me losing track of time in my thoughts again, but the sun was beginning to set. I began my usual chores, putting out an evening meal and water for the beasts, and while they feasted, ate some myself. I was a bit hungry, having not properly finished lunch and about to skip dinner, but after the earlier conversation, I’d really rather avoid giving them the opportunity to talk to me.
After the birds had their fill, and by that I mean they emptied the tray as they always do, I let out the call, and they started funneling into the cattle house. The lonely straggler being first to go and hop into its nesting box. I bet tomorrow I will have trouble with getting her out of there again...
I took the moment to gather some eggs the birds left over course of the day, and once that was over and all of them were accounted for, I closed it up. When I flew down over to the house, there wasn’t anyone by the back door thankfully, so I just left eggs there, returned the basket, and returned to my room through the window.
Well, at least I didn’t get nearly killed today... That’s nice I guess?
I was about to check my holopad when there was a knock on the door. I approached and opened it to see... Kenneth. Standing in the doorway.
“Uh, hi, Krekos. I just, uh... Wanted to apologize again. I really wish mom and dad told me everything ahead of time... I just want you to know, I have no problems with you whatsoever, yeah? It’s just. Surprising, I guess, to hear all that. I didn’t think there were any defectors from the fleet at all... Just. Uh, please don’t worry about me?” He offered me a small smile, showing his canines before quickly correcting himself and doing a closed-lip one. “I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories or make you feel unwelcome.”
I had to take a moment to contemplate his words. Was Lena and Reginald’s weirdness hereditary? He almost reminded me of how Reginald talked to me early on, with constant stumbling over the words, as well as constant reassurances that he is fine with me being here. Couple that with failing to avoid predatory mannerisms like eye contact and smiles like Lena tends to and you get this human. But most importantly and least understandably, there was the general fact of him and them just... welcoming me. I couldn’t understand why. I should be one sorry to them.
“N-No, it’s fine... I’m sorry for... intruding on you and your family.”
“No, no, dude, you’re fine! I mean, hell, I was considering entering one of those exchange programs before the bombings happened, and even after, well, I did my best at Fahl to be the perfect friendly soldier just there to make sure no more bombs drop on my home and not kill or conquer anyone. And then mom told me your story, and I can’t believe it... Just... If you have any issues, feel free to tell me. I’m not one of those racist pricks that are too pussy to even call themselves HF anymore because they know they’ll get their teeth knocked. I get that there aren't good or bad species, just people. And you seem like a decent guy if mom and dad’s judgment is to be trusted.” His smile widened, though it was clear from tension on his face that he had to take conscious effort to keep teeth hidden. “So, what I said earlier stands. Friends, right?”
He extends hand forward, for a second time today. I wasn’t sure if I knew this human long enough to call him a friend... Any human really. But it also seems like human definition of ‘friends’ is anyone they’re cordial and peaceful with. Which is weird. You’d think translators would properly use ‘acquaintance’ for that.
Still... We will be living in the same house now. I can’t just say no, and... I can’t come up with a reason to say no. Even him being a predator and a human is not something I could really say I object to, considering how... mundane that became to me over my time here.
So, with naught on my mind but acceptance of the situation, I extended my wing and grasped his hand with my claw. This time he actually gripped it tightly and moved it up and down, as I saw other humans do occasionally.
“Yeah... I guess that’d be for the best.” I responded, shrugging off the hesitation. Fresh start for a third time, I guess?
The human grinned, forgetting to hide his teeth entirely, but I was ready for it somehow and avoided outwardly reacting.
“Cool! Anyway, I’ll try to get some shuteye early, I couldn’t sleep on the overnight flight home. See ya!”
And with that he left. Well... That meeting went well I suppose?
I returned to my nest and picked up my holopad, returning to what I was doing. And there it was, something I awaited every day. A notification that I was messaged on mailing app. Opening the letter revealed the schedule for the study program. Which... only had one day marked on it. And a note that the rest of it will be figured out ‘as we go from there’. So it’s not a schedule, it’s just a mark for the day of the first meeting.
While a bit underwhelming, it was still exciting. It would be an all-alien class so I wouldn’t have to deal with humans’ incomprehensibility nearly as much, and it would allow me to finally return to pursuing what I actually dreamt of. Even if I wasn’t entirely sure that was precisely what I wanted after everything that happened, it was at least something for me to move towards.
...just two days until start. I wonder if there’s some required reading to prepare?
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Big thank you to NoP community for being great and supportive of my endeavors!
Also, obviously, big thanks to SpacePaladin15 for creating this universe and allowing fanfiction well to flow free!
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Date [standardized human time]: May 6th, 2137
I stare at the foul creature before me. Normally staring at something directly head on like that would be too predatory for me to do, but after nearly dying of bread yesterday, I didn’t feel patient enough to be gentle. The creature stared right back, though in a much more natural, prey-like way, tilting its head slightly as it looked back at me with one eye and let out a long bwok.
“Are you doing this now? Really?”, I ask, knowing full well it cannot respond.
Well, it can, if another bwok it made is any indication. Of course, translators aren’t yet advanced enough to translate non-sapient speech, but the intention behind sound is intuitively clear. It’s telling me to back off. Well, I tried the diplomatic approach at least.
Raising my wing I begin sliding the bird out of its nest, careful to keep any delicate joints out of its reach. It started clucking in upset indignation, struggling back and even trying to peck at me, but after realizing that I will not relent, it hopped out of the box and rushed out of the cattle house, revealing a single dead egg in the nesting box.
With relief, I finally pick up the last egg and head back to leave them at the house. Turns out that while Reginald didn’t forget to both lock them up yesterday and let them out today, he did neglect feeding them both times, as well as collecting the harvest. So when I was driven back here in early morning, the first thing I did was making sure they were taken care of. I can’t say the horrid birds looked in any way hungry, but the moment I poured the feeding grain for them, they attacked it with more viciousness than I’d expect of an actual predator. And yet only thirteen were present at the feeding, as the one that’s usually the target of flock’s ire remained in the cattle house yet again, Reginald leaving it to it, being unaware of its undesirable habit of trying to hatch dead eggs.
With eggs delivered, I flew my way to my usual spot atop the cattle house and could finally relax. The loner beast first made its way to feast on the scraps of the grain that other birds already all have had their fill of, so I wasn’t too concerned. Instead I tried to reflect on the morning I had so far.
Waking up at the hospital did make me momentarily panic before I remembered the precluding events. Not that I could properly panic, feeling the most starved I’ve been my whole life, and too weak to try flying out of the window. Thankfully, the breakfast they provided was actually well made with krakotl needs in mind, algae soup alongside a few slices of bread, this time without any horrid human ideas like putting eggs in there. Eggs! Turns out they put eggs in some kinds of bread! That’s how I got sick! Eggs! The thought of what I consumed even now made me queasy, and it definitely made breakfast a much less appetizing affair than it would have been without that knowledge, but back then the hunger won over the disgust.
Lena did keep her promise and came to pick me up extra early. Her being a staff member at the hospital gave her some extra privilege, I assume, hence why I was released without any forms needing to be filled out personally. She did have important business today too, which probably explained the earlyness and urgency of her driving me back to her house.
That did not mean I escaped her ire, however. While I couldn’t pinpoint anything to identify the man, as Bob was apparently a common name, that offered me bread, we did come to understanding that he was likely either unaware of the nutritional contents of it, or of extent to which the Cure-induced allergy would be affecting a krakotl. Yet, Lena seemed much angrier at me for failing to take any precautions. Turns out that was the purpose of medicinal injectors, epipens as humans call them, that were provided to me. I was supposed to have them on me in case I accidentally ingested contaminated food. Nobody told me that, I was just handed them back when I first received the necessities at the refugee camp and I had no clue what they were for. Then she also berated me for eating random food from strangers and ignoring bad flavors. Turns out that brioche bread isn’t actually bitter at all, and that was my body reacting to an allergen in it. Reaction that I unwisely elected to ignore, to further ire of my host. By the end, several new rules of my stay here were made, including not eating things I don’t know and always having at least one epipen on me. Thankfully, these rules would be ones I’d start following even without them being established, so I won’t have to concern myself with being kicked out over accidentally breaking them.
Trying to distract myself from thoughts of yesterday’s incident, I focused my attention on the flock. All birds accounted for, so at least I knew that my absence did not result in the predator coming to snatch one of them. I do not wish to insult my hosts, but Reginald is far from most attentive people in matters unrelated to his job, and I am not sure the birds were watched at all while I was out. Speaking of, my scannings of surrounding treelines revealed no sign of the predator today. Perhaps it departed to hunt elsewhere, or maybe it ventured too close to a more populated area and exterminators dealt with it.
Actually, did human exterminators work similar to Federation ones? I knew for a fact they had them, although they seemed like a market of private organizations if advertisements are anything to judge by. Still, what methods do they use? I know humans oppose fire, and do not believe in predatory taint, but surely they have measures to protect themselves? They are, by self-admission, far from the best natural predator, and I doubt Earth’s non-sapient predators would just leave humans be. Maybe I should call one of those human exterminator agencies and call them in to deal with that predator? I haven’t told Lena or Reginald about it, as I didn’t want to bother them, but it could pose a serious threat to the cattle, but maybe that’s the way I could resolve it without involving them?
I have not done nearly as much research into human culture and lifestyle as I should have, considering that I’ve lived on Earth for over half a year now, but the sheer width of the topic always overwhelmed me the moment I opened internet search app to the point where I just closed it right away.
Extra loud call from the flock made me refocus my attention on them, but it was nothing. Just the loner getting pecked extra hard and lashing out against assailants, causing a small aimless stampede as all the birds ran around in circles, puffing up at one another. The assailants now looked a lot more like victims. I could understand those birds more than I could humans at least. The loner bird is clearly an odd one out. It’s the only one repeatedly trying to hatch unfertilized eggs it lays, and it seems to always avoid the rest of the flock. Humans may deny the existence of Predator Disease, but they can’t deny that prey and predator both can and will sometimes behave in unnatural ways that may threaten the herd's safety. Or pack’s, in case of humans. Birds must know on instinctual level that the loner’s behavior is unnatural and are attempting to combat the Predator Disease on instinctual level. And since that is natural, I still will not interfere in this, unless the loner bird actually becomes a threat to others or will start getting too injured. The first time I attempted to pick one of the birds up was the only time for a good reason, as I have learned their viciousness all too well.
DING-DING
The sudden loud ring startled me enough that I nearly tumbled off the roof. Who would be coming over now? Lena and Reginald have left together and shouldn’t be back until afternoon, and they’d never use the bell. That means someone must be here for them. But wouldn’t they warn anyone to not come over? Especially with their plans for today.
With nobody to answer these questions, I had no choice but to go and discover the answer myself, flying up and over the house, towards the entrance gate. The moment I passed the house roof, I already saw a familiar silhouette. It was the human child from a few days ago.
Thankfully, Lena’s insistence on me carrying an epipen at all times meant I also carried my satchel at all times too, so I didn’t have to go grabbing my holopad, and took it out. But before I could even launch the translator TTS app to type out a greeting, the child was already hopping in place with excitement.
“Mr. Krekos! Hi! I came over to visit!”, she exclaimed, showing off her teeth in an unnerving expression of human joy. I simply tried to avoid that and focused on the pad, typing out my response.
“Hello, Rosie. Why are you here?”
The question was genuine, as the child was not carrying any more of that honey substance from last time.
“I just came over to visit you! Is that okay? Are Mr. and Ms. Vince okay with it?”
Visit... me? Why? While I was confused, I did instinctively type out a reply.
“They did tell me visitors are allowed as long as there’s no trouble when I first moved in.”
And before I could type a followup message asking her why she’s here, she already let out a joyous roar and ran past me.
“Can I see the chickens?”, she asked, and not waiting for an answer, rushed past the house and towards the cattle yard.
“Wait! You’ll scare them!”, I yell after her, but of course without a translator she can’t understand me as she runs like she already knows where to go.
And indeed she has, quickly rushing up to the open field where the birds were grazing. Thankfully she didn’t start chasing them, instead just approaching the flock from a distance and swaying in place, watching them with what I assume was some sort of predatory excitement at the sight of prey. Maybe that’s where the contained hunting instinct of human children showed themselves? In chasing small birds? I was still more subdued, considering she stopped shy of causing a small stampede, but still.
“Grandpa used to take me with him! He helped watch this farm until Mr. and Ms. Vince moved in. I like chickens! I think they’re cute.”, the child told me innocently as she kept swaying and watching as the beasts grazed upon insects of the pasture.
That revelation was... interesting. I suppose it makes sense that between the original owner of this land dying in the bombings and Lena and Reginald moving in, it would be unattended. With nobody to feed and watch over those things, they would be long dead for sure. And it was Rosie’s grandfather... Speaking of. I typed out my words.
“Does your grandfather know you’re here?”
She seemed to get a weird look as she stopped her excited swaying, fiddling with her hands instead. Looks like I asked the correct question.
“...he knows I am out visiting neighbors.”
That did not answer my question. I squinted at the human child, and she dipped her head as she continued.
“...he doesn’t know I’m here specifically. Or that an alien even lives here...”, she explained, her tone suddenly more sullen.
I couldn’t help but squint at that, and it appears that my expression was readable enough that even a human could see the suspicion, as she continued.
“I’m sorry... But if I told grandpa, he’d tell me I’m forbidden from talking to you, like he forbade me from talking to hedgehog people in town... But I want to talk to you! You’re nice and you’re a space bird!”
The child was actually working around the rules established by her guardian to come see me. I don’t know if I should be glad or concerned. Clearly, the man is anti-alien in his opinions, and I’d rather that kind of man not know about how close he lives to one. At the same time, I’d rather not encourage a child for lying to their guardian in order to meet a stranger they know they aren’t allowed to interact with... So I just took the middle path with my next message.
“I see. What did you want to talk to me about then?”, TTS speaks for me.
Her stiffened body language disappears, replaced again with earlier excitement.
“I wanna know more about space! And aliens! It’s all so cool but grandpa says it’s all dangerous because mom and dad died. But it’s not! The hedgehog people were nice, and you’re nice too!”
I wasn’t sure about that logic, but my self-preservation told me I shouldn’t try convincing her to go confessing. Instead I focused more on her chosen topic.
“I am not sure I am the best person to ask about space. I am not a scientist or traveler.”
“But you’re from there! You know way more than me. I don’t even know what you are called. And there’s gotta be cool things out in space!”
I let out a sigh. I suppose it’s childlike curiosity at its finest. So unfamiliar with mundane that it is a wonder. I remember being like that about becoming a doctor.
I quickly tapped on the pad.
“Okay, I can answer questions, but I may not know everything.”
The noise that came out of the girl was like a squeal of a panicked dossur as she started hopping and spinning in place.
“Yes! Yes! Thank you, Mr. Krekos!” Sudden movement did cause me to recoil a bit, which in turn caused her to cease her happy flailing and adjust her little dress. “I dunno where to start though... Hm... What are you?”
...for all my trepidation about not knowing answers, I should have anticipated that the questions she asks will be rather age-appropriate and on the same level as we learn in our first school classes. At least I won’t disappoint her then.
“I am from a species called ‘krakotl’. We’re avians, as is obvious. Our home is...”
Thankfully she did not question my hesitant pause. Instead she just nodded along.
“What about the hedgehog people? I already know venlil, but they’re the only ones I know name of.”
Hedgehog people in town she mentioned earlier. The only species I could think of that could be seen there would be the gojid. I have no clue what hedgehogs are, but probably some creature with visible similarity to them.
“They are called ‘gojid’, and they’re from gojid Cradle. Both of our species are... well, used to be known for our might and protecting other species of Federation.”
I am not sure if that’s something to brag about, considering... everything. But I didn’t want this child to get brought down with depressing regrets of our species. Let her know something nicer instead. She clearly lost a lot, but there’s still joy left in her. I wouldn’t want to be the one to ruin that.
“Cool! What about other people? I wanna know more!”
And so I went on, telling her about various species, although I mostly focused on ones in this new human-led union, only mentioning kolshians and farsul beyond that. It’s weird explaining to a child what a tilfish or a harchen looks like, but thankfully my holopad isn’t just a method of communicating with implant-less children. With access to interstellar web, I could easily pull up pictures of various alien species to show to her, even if she struggled to believe that some of them were even sapient purely based off of looks. With how varied species in Federation are, and how some of us admittedly aren’t too far physiologically from our more primal ancestors.
Among other topics, she asked me to tell her interesting things, which I didn’t know much of. I told her about Venlil Prime’s tidally locked status, a rarity among habitable planets, much less homeworlds for species. I told her about the unique architecture of Mileau, designed to accommodate both species of regular size and dossur themselves. I told her about Colia medical academies, some of the most beautiful medical facilities in the galaxy.
I wish I was more well-travelled, but I just wasn’t. My whole life, I never left Nishtal until the extermination fleet took me despite my protests. That may have been what saved my life...
“Hey! Stop that!”
I flinched as I heard the child yell, but quickly realized that it wasn’t directed at me. Instead, Rosie was rushing down towards the chicken flock, breaking up the fight in which the loner was being pecked by a few larger chickens. As the human child approached, the birds stopped their infighting and scattered in different directions, crowing in loud panic and discontent. On instinct, I found myself rushing towards the child, forgetting about translation entirely.
“What are you doing?! Don’t touch them!”
I didn’t want her to hurt the cattle accidentally, and I didn’t want her to get hurt by the angry birds in return. But, it seems like the moment the birds scattered, she was satisfied with her actions and turned back to me, wearing another one of her happy smiles.
“Sorry, Mr. Krekos, I just saw chickens being mean. Bad chickens.” She explained.
I was baffled. Why would she interfere like that? When I tried that back when I was just starting, that got me pecked! But with her, the birds just scattered. What if they pecked her?
I took the pad out again and started typing quickly.
“That was dangerous. Why did you do that? What if they attacked you? Why are you even interfering in their natural dynamics?”, questions flowed out of my pad with an artificial human voice.
The girl simply giggled.
“They’re chickens! They aren’t dangerous. They don’t peck that painful and I’ve been scratched worse before. And I have to stop it because bullying is wrong.”
Then she actually noticed that the one that was being attacked wandered close. She casually approached it from behind, the blind spot and just reached down and grabbed it, picking the bird up. I was ready to rush to help the bird when...
“Mwah! There, all better.”
She did a human ‘kiss’ on the back of the cattle bird’s neck before releasing it, the surprise of it causing it to rush off. I knew what kisses were, I’ve seen enough of them between Lena and Reginald, but I believed they were gestures of intimate affection, not... what was even that?
It seems Rosie noticed my confusion as she explained.
“You gotta kiss it so it heals better! That’s what mom taught me.” The child displayed that smile of hers shamelessly. With how much I was being exposed to it, it almost wasn’t unnerving anymore. Still, it was interesting to learn that kisses are seen as something that helps wounds. I guess some species do have saliva with mild antiseptic properties, wouldn’t be too out there to assume humans are the same. And if that’s the case, maybe that’s how the kissing tradition started? Exchange of protective fluid between lovers?
“I see. I did not know that.” I responded before letting my puffed feathers relax. Okay, this whole ‘watching a human child’ thing is turning out to somehow be even more stressful than I expected at first.
“Wait, Mr. Krekos, what time is it?” She suddenly asked, looking up at the sky.
“It’s nearly twelve.” I respond, holopad having a convenient clock for local time.
“Oh no! I need to be home soon! Was nice seeing you Mr. Krekos gotta go bye!”
Before I had even a chance at typing out an answer or my own goodbye, the child sprinted away and back towards the entrance. I had to take flight just to keep up, and even then she just turned around, waved her arm at me and then kept sprinting down the road after leaving the gate. I simply offered a small wave of a wing back before locking the gate again. I suppose it is hard to keep track of time without a device or clock nearby...
Well, at least I had the usual peace and quiet now. And learned a bit more about the creatures I was in charge of. I should really try to deal with my aversion to looking things up on the human internet...
Just as I was about to head back out towards the yard, I heard a loud car horn, a familiar one, getting my attention. Lena’s car. There they were, signaling me, probably having spotted me at the gate from afar. Deciding to make use of my presence here, and hoping to avoid needing to explain that I had a surprise visitor earlier, I went ahead and opened the large gate, allowing the car to enter.
Once it was parked in the usual space, the doors opened and three people came out. Lena and Reginald were both looking a bit disheveled, but their faces carried these smiles that seemed wider than ever before. And third person... Was a stranger. A human I knew of, but never actually met. As he exited the car, a large bag in one hand, he just stared at me, standing in the front yard...
“...okay, I expected many things when I was told you guys housed a refugee, but not this.”
Oh no. Oh no, he was not one of the ones that was willing to overlook an invader that partook in bombing of his planet being allowed to walk free, of course, Lena and Reginald were the weird ones like that, doesn’t mean their son won’t be... I felt the panic rising as I realized I’d need to return to the camp. Why was I upset about that? This was supposed to just have been a way to make money, but now I have a free education program. Do I need to stay? No, but... Why?! Why do I not want to leave?
“Ken, you said it’s going to be alright no matter what it is, right? Wanted us to keep it a surprise to meet a new friend?” Lena’s voice. She should have told him, that’d give me time to prepare why didn’t they give me time why.
“No, no problems, just, really surprised, that’s all... uh... hey, buddy, you okay? You’re really... trembly.”
He was approaching me, and instinct took over as I recoiled, before stuttering out my answer.
“I-I’m fine...”
...thankfully translators don’t translate voice cracks. I hope, at least...
“Hey, relax... I have no problem with you being a krakotl, I just didn’t think...” He looks over at Lena and Reginald. “Calm down... I can wear my visor if you want?”
Right. Those things humans use to hide their scary faces from us.
“I... I’m good...”
There was some emotion I struggled to read on the young human’s face, as he sighed and shook his head.
“I screwed this up, I’m sorry. Let... Let me try again.” He straightened out, and adjusted his clothing, before slowly approaching me and giving me a small smile, no teeth showing. “Hello. My name is Kenneth Vince and I'm son of Lena and Reginald Vince. I was told you’re a refugee they took in to help out. It’s nice to meet you. What’s your name?”
That... snapped me out of it. Right... He was... not upset at my existence. He was just very surprised that Lena and Reginald weren’t. That’s a reasonable thing to be surprised about, considering I was surprised about it to this day. I tried to compose myself as I responded.
“My name is Krekos. I live here as... hired help with the cattle. It’s... nice to meet you?”
The smile on Kenneth’s face widens, though he still refrains from showing his teeth. Instead, he extends a hand towards me. A handshake is a human gesture that I found far from comfortable, but I didn’t want to give him a reason to change his mind on acceptability of my existence, so I took it with a wingclaw. He gently took it and held for a few seconds before letting go and sighing again, turning to his parents.
“You know, I always thought you guys would be empty nesters, but I never thought it’d be that literal.”
That got all three of them laughing, as I just tilted my head in confusion. I was fairly sure there were no empty nests in the house until after I adjusted the attic room for my own accommodations. Still, I took the laughter as a sign that the tense moment had fully passed and let my ruffled feathers slowly rest.
“Let’s head inside. Krekos, we’re having dinner, you’re welcome to join us.” Reginald said, picking up Kenneth’s bag. I tilted my head a little and he followed up with elaboration. “We will be having meat... But there’s still going to be stuff you can eat too. It’s a celebration, so I prepared a bit of everything.”
“Dad, you shouldn’t have!” Kenneth responded with embarrassment.
“None of that! Our son returned from the war, alive and a hero, and we can have a celebration. Krekos, I know you’re still... uncertain about meat so you don’t—”
“I’ll join.”
Wait, who said that? And why did they say that in my voice?
Wait, that was me. Why did I say that?
“That’s great to hear! I’ve got some nice steamed broccoli and some vegetarian fried rice as sides that you’ll enjoy!” Reginald smiled at me and I felt myself shrinking into my feathers. That the humans didn’t notice at least, proceeding into the house instead.
Well, looks like I signed my warrant. At least my bag and my epipen were on me in case something at the table triggers the allergy again. Would be rather unfortunate to have it happen two days in a row.
And that’s how, in just ten or so minutes, I found myself sitting at the dining perch, while humans took seats in chairs, all consuming chunks of roasted flesh and somehow managing to also stuff pieces of equally roasted plants in, and converse with one another. You wouldn’t be able to tell on first look, but despite their mouths being relatively small, especially for a predator, it seems they compensate for it by having those be near bottomless in both hunger and small talk.
I am not sure how I managed to shift my focus away from them consuming animal matter in front of me, however vat grown it might have been, and onto their conversation instead, but I succeeded. I suppose that was just part of me going native around predators. Soon, I’ll be the one feasting along with them before I know it, and snacking on those epipens to not die of it.
“So, Fahl? That’s where you were sent after the Battle of Earth?” Lena asked.
“Yeah. From what I heard, we got a light posting compared to guys at Sillis or Mileau. The most I had to deal with was some exterminator insurgents.”
That’s right. Since harchen participated in the Extermination Fleet, they were one of those who were occupied by humans during the war. It makes sense that there was at least some ground resistance.
“Honestly, the worst thing out there was the heat. Not the flamethrower kind, the climate. The place was so damn dry and hot. At least exterminators you could subdue or evade. Not so much with the scorching sun!”
I couldn’t resist a small chuckle at the idea of a predator being more afraid of hot weather than flamethrowers as I slowly pecked at the vegetables on my plate. Thankfully it was set far enough aside from any meat dishes that no contamination should occur, but I was still examining pieces before putting them in my mouth just in case.
Seems like reacting was a mistake though, as that brought Kenneth’s attention onto me. He finished chewing latest piece of flesh and pointed a fork at me.
“So, Krekos... Where are you from? Cradle was my guess, but I do know there were refugees from other places like Sillis too.”
That’s a weird question. Isn’t it kind of to be expected for a krakotl to be from our actual homeworld?”
“I’m from Nishtal.”
“No, no, that’s not what I meant,” Kenneth chuckled, tossing a piece of broccoli into his mouth and swallowing before continuing, “I meant, where did you live? I kind of assumed you were born there, but it’s not like Nishtal had a chance to send refugees out, and if they did, this is the last place they’d be.”
Oh... I caught concerned looks of Lena and Reginald, looking between me and Kenneth from both sides. Not only did they not make him aware that I was a krakotl, they also neglected to mention just how I came by my refugee status... Which was just a legal workaround to grant me asylum without unnecessary complications or establishing undesirable precedent. Legally, I may be a refugee, but practically... I am a defector. Lena and Reginald know that, I told them my story before. And while they were weirdly accepting, Kenneth... Fought extermination fleet here on Earth. Personally.
Still, I wasn’t about to lie. It took a few moments and gathering mental strength to steel myself, and averting my eyes, focusing on the plate of warm vegetables in front of me rather than the human’s anticipating stare before I answered.
“I did live on Nishtal. I... I came with the extermination fleet.” I responded, doing my best to avoid looking at him. I did not want to witness his reaction, for some reason the thought of seeing it weighed heavy on my mind.
“Oh.”
The response was simple, and had no followup. There was no more clinking of cutlery against plates, or chewing. The only thing hanging in the air of the kitchen was silence, weighing down on me. It dragged on and on... until it just got so unbearable I couldn’t take it.
“I-I’m full... Thank you for the meal.” I quickly said, hopping off the perch and stepping out of the kitchen, quickly making my way to the yard and taking flight.
Fresh air of the outside and rush of it as I flew up and gained speed... I missed that. I knew it’s not safe to just fly over other people’s territory, so I corrected my course into doing large sweeping circles over the cattle yard and simply let my wings carry me.
I closed my eyes. With them closed and not focusing on my angle it feels like I’m actually flying away from all the troubles. Away from humans who barely tolerate my existence, away from gojid who see me as worse than a predator, away from Earth and all its incorrigible customs, away from horrid cattle, away from constant memories...
Flying feels nice. It may be a bit harder than it was home, but it’s still possible. I heard that on Venlil Prime or Mileau it’s much harder. But here? Just an extra flap of wings for every few paces and you’re just fine, free to soar the skies...
Slowly I let my eyes open back to the bleak reality. Greenery of surrounding pastures and woods, bright blue skies and farmhouses dotted about here and there greeted me. I lowered my gaze down, focusing on what’s below. There they were, fourteen brown and black dots spread around the enclosed portion of the farm territory. I am not sure how much time I’ve spent flying in circles and trying to forget things but my wings were feeling a tad sore. Then as I just began slow descent, in same circular motion, I noticed that one of the birds, a familiar one, was being chased by several others. Recounting the morning, I tried putting the knowledge to action, and shifted direction of descent, swooping down. To my surprise, that actually worked, as the moment I got close to the ground, the cattle birds all got much louder and scattered in all directions, including the loner. Who, at least this time, got off unharmed. I suppose such pathetic flightless creatures would fear a flying one much more than they would when I just run up to them...
With the fight preemptively broken up, I flutter up to the roof of the cattle house, to my usual position and rested my wings. I didn’t see any movement from the direction of the house, so I suppose the family is still busy unpacking. Since Kenneth joined the military just before the Battle of Earth, and Lena and Reginald only moved here after their actual house in city of New York got destroyed, it’d be the first time the human is seeing what is basically his new home. There was a room set aside for him since before I even moved in, and while there is also a guest room... That one did not have a large enough window to fit through, which did not feel comfortable. So when I asked for a space with a bigger window they only had an attic to offer. They seemed uncomfortable letting me live in a tiny room with slanted roof, but I found such space more comforting than I would have a large room with a window not large enough to fit even one fully spread wing through.
I wonder if Kenneth will need as much renovation as I did? The house is built for humans, but he never lived there before. Will he need to buy a more comfortable bed? Getting a proper nesting setup in place of a bed took a bit of effort, but I figured something out. Human sheets were comfortable enough for such, and sitting perches were thankfully not that hard to get thanks to help from the refugee administration. Maybe that’s the things that Lena went to buy yesterday? Kenneth’s preferred room decor?
I looked up to the sky to see the sun beginning to dim. I am not sure if it was me flying that long, or me losing track of time in my thoughts again, but the sun was beginning to set. I began my usual chores, putting out an evening meal and water for the beasts, and while they feasted, ate some myself. I was a bit hungry, having not properly finished lunch and about to skip dinner, but after the earlier conversation, I’d really rather avoid giving them the opportunity to talk to me.
After the birds had their fill, and by that I mean they emptied the tray as they always do, I let out the call, and they started funneling into the cattle house. The lonely straggler being first to go and hop into its nesting box. I bet tomorrow I will have trouble with getting her out of there again...
I took the moment to gather some eggs the birds left over course of the day, and once that was over and all of them were accounted for, I closed it up. When I flew down over to the house, there wasn’t anyone by the back door thankfully, so I just left eggs there, returned the basket, and returned to my room through the window.
Well, at least I didn’t get nearly killed today... That’s nice I guess?
I was about to check my holopad when there was a knock on the door. I approached and opened it to see... Kenneth. Standing in the doorway.
“Uh, hi, Krekos. I just, uh... Wanted to apologize again. I really wish mom and dad told me everything ahead of time... I just want you to know, I have no problems with you whatsoever, yeah? It’s just. Surprising, I guess, to hear all that. I didn’t think there were any defectors from the fleet at all... Just. Uh, please don’t worry about me?” He offered me a small smile, showing his canines before quickly correcting himself and doing a closed-lip one. “I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories or make you feel unwelcome.”
I had to take a moment to contemplate his words. Was Lena and Reginald’s weirdness hereditary? He almost reminded me of how Reginald talked to me early on, with constant stumbling over the words, as well as constant reassurances that he is fine with me being here. Couple that with failing to avoid predatory mannerisms like eye contact and smiles like Lena tends to and you get this human. But most importantly and least understandably, there was the general fact of him and them just... welcoming me. I couldn’t understand why. I should be one sorry to them.
“N-No, it’s fine... I’m sorry for... intruding on you and your family.”
“No, no, dude, you’re fine! I mean, hell, I was considering entering one of those exchange programs before the bombings happened, and even after, well, I did my best at Fahl to be the perfect friendly soldier just there to make sure no more bombs drop on my home and not kill or conquer anyone. And then mom told me your story, and I can’t believe it... Just... If you have any issues, feel free to tell me. I’m not one of those racist pricks that are too pussy to even call themselves HF anymore because they know they’ll get their teeth knocked. I get that there aren't good or bad species, just people. And you seem like a decent guy if mom and dad’s judgment is to be trusted.” His smile widened, though it was clear from tension on his face that he had to take conscious effort to keep teeth hidden. “So, what I said earlier stands. Friends, right?”
He extends hand forward, for a second time today. I wasn’t sure if I knew this human long enough to call him a friend... Any human really. But it also seems like human definition of ‘friends’ is anyone they’re cordial and peaceful with. Which is weird. You’d think translators would properly use ‘acquaintance’ for that.
Still... We will be living in the same house now. I can’t just say no, and... I can’t come up with a reason to say no. Even him being a predator and a human is not something I could really say I object to, considering how... mundane that became to me over my time here.
So, with naught on my mind but acceptance of the situation, I extended my wing and grasped his hand with my claw. This time he actually gripped it tightly and moved it up and down, as I saw other humans do occasionally.
“Yeah... I guess that’d be for the best.” I responded, shrugging off the hesitation. Fresh start for a third time, I guess?
The human grinned, forgetting to hide his teeth entirely, but I was ready for it somehow and avoided outwardly reacting.
“Cool! Anyway, I’ll try to get some shuteye early, I couldn’t sleep on the overnight flight home. See ya!”
And with that he left. Well... That meeting went well I suppose?
I returned to my nest and picked up my holopad, returning to what I was doing. And there it was, something I awaited every day. A notification that I was messaged on mailing app. Opening the letter revealed the schedule for the study program. Which... only had one day marked on it. And a note that the rest of it will be figured out ‘as we go from there’. So it’s not a schedule, it’s just a mark for the day of the first meeting.
While a bit underwhelming, it was still exciting. It would be an all-alien class so I wouldn’t have to deal with humans’ incomprehensibility nearly as much, and it would allow me to finally return to pursuing what I actually dreamt of. Even if I wasn’t entirely sure that was precisely what I wanted after everything that happened, it was at least something for me to move towards.
...just two days until start. I wonder if there’s some required reading to prepare?
2024.05.19 08:15 WittyManner0 How am I able to earn more
Long story short:
I work in the medical field, even though I did my basic study. And finished it with a university master, I earn not that much… I would like some advice on what to do.
Earnings: So currently I earn around €3k a month for 30 hours. I am going to work for 38 hours and expect to earn €3.8k. I am 24 now so I still earn much for my age, but the future isn’t bright.
Because I am quite good (not to brag about) in my specific field I am going up fast. I could earn between €4-5k within 1-2 years. However this is the maximal, after this specific number I haven’t seen people earn more in my field. I don’t want to work till 50-60 with this future ahead.
Option 1: Starting for my self, even though it cost much money. I know I make around 120k a year for my job, so if I fully start for myself I could earn around 120k a year. The plan is to do this asap.
Option 2: I did quite a few coding courses and am quite good with it. I was wondering maybe to do something in the IT as part time job and keep my medical job, because I like to do this work aswell.
Option 3: Starting my own practice with workers. I could start my own practice and hire workers. There is no limit to what you earn then.
Option 4: Maybe advice from you guys ??
Sorry English isn’t my first language. I am looking forward to all responses.
submitted by WittyManner0 to personalfinance [link] [comments]
I work in the medical field, even though I did my basic study. And finished it with a university master, I earn not that much… I would like some advice on what to do.
Earnings: So currently I earn around €3k a month for 30 hours. I am going to work for 38 hours and expect to earn €3.8k. I am 24 now so I still earn much for my age, but the future isn’t bright.
Because I am quite good (not to brag about) in my specific field I am going up fast. I could earn between €4-5k within 1-2 years. However this is the maximal, after this specific number I haven’t seen people earn more in my field. I don’t want to work till 50-60 with this future ahead.
Option 1: Starting for my self, even though it cost much money. I know I make around 120k a year for my job, so if I fully start for myself I could earn around 120k a year. The plan is to do this asap.
Option 2: I did quite a few coding courses and am quite good with it. I was wondering maybe to do something in the IT as part time job and keep my medical job, because I like to do this work aswell.
Option 3: Starting my own practice with workers. I could start my own practice and hire workers. There is no limit to what you earn then.
Option 4: Maybe advice from you guys ??
Sorry English isn’t my first language. I am looking forward to all responses.
2024.05.19 08:10 nomorelandfills California rescuers clamoring for adoption of AB 2265, Animal Shelter Transparency Act cheerfully agree to remove the bit about mandatory spay/neuter before a dog or cat is released to foster. Also, the law is another gateway for release of dangerous dogs.
 | https://preview.redd.it/8wd5vanfrb1d1.png?width=536&format=png&auto=webp&s=4348ee55b7aa2fd3a7d70737d11ffd1979b19f61 submitted by nomorelandfills to PetRescueExposed [link] [comments] To be honest, I didn't read the dangerous dog part as thoroughly as I should. I think I may be somewhat burnt out on the recklessness and coldness shown by rescuers to others in their willingness to prioritize dangerous or marginal ownerless dogs over beloved pets and over people. The spay/neuter part, that just galls me. It should gall anyone. This crisis, this hellscape of pit bull overpopulation that exists clearly calls for sterilization of any shelter dog in California. Shrugging off that as a lesser priority than rehoming existing dogs blows the whole deal. Any animal rescue plan that removes, downgrades or fails to prioritize spay/neuter for pit bulls is worthless. It's just a smokescreen, a way to play with puppies and posture as saviors without doing anything to improve the situation. Status quo, nothing to see here, #adoptdontshop. https://preview.redd.it/if3jg07kpb1d1.png?width=873&format=png&auto=webp&s=bde9e6f11f3311da914d8c76a66d3907e0118374 SUMMARY: Under existing law, it is the policy of the state that no adoptable animal should be euthanized if it can be adopted into a suitable home, as provided. This bill declares it the policy of the state that no animal be euthanized by a public animal control agency, shelter, or a private entity that contracts with a public animal control agency or shelter for animal care and control services (collectively, “eligible agency”). This bill requires an eligible agency to post, 24 to 72 hours before a scheduled euthanasia of a dog or cat, a daily list of any cat or dog scheduled for euthanasia on its public website or social media page and to post a physical notice on the kennel of a dog or cat scheduled to be euthanized. This bill requires a public animal control agency or shelter that seeks to adopt a policy, practice, or protocol that may conflict with Hayden’s Law to give notice regarding the policy, practice, or protocol, as specified, and requires the city or county to schedule a public hearing regarding the policy, practice, or protocol. https://preview.redd.it/r6ett982nb1d1.png?width=701&format=png&auto=webp&s=5a4b03df0544234fd1c1a32dc1ad2396314d7a75 And the sheer chutzpah of this https://preview.redd.it/6jzq88epob1d1.png?width=588&format=png&auto=webp&s=01830f3ea95e94084d4bd927d96ba33fc7732b24 Rescuers - we will advocate for violent dogs and fund their owners' fights to keep them from being designated dangerous and harass communities into being extremely afraid of even starting a dangerous dog investigation. Also rescuers - our new legislation to require more marketing of unadoptable dogs won't include dangerous dogs! Silly! There's no risk to the public! Although I will say I had no idea that rescuers knew of the existence of the word 'transparency' so good for them. Perhaps this knowledge could be turned inward sometimes? The CityWatch article ANIMAL WATCH - An increasing number of reported vicious and fatal dog attacks across California, as reported by the L.A. Times—and worldwide—are ignored by AB 2265 (2024) authored by Assembly Member Kevin McCarthy and introduced in the CA Assembly—and, instead, it prohibits euthanasia of any dangerous animals, including dogs impounded in shelters for violent behavior. AB 2265, (which has so far been amended twice, the latest change being when it was introduced in the Assembly on 3/18/2024) wants California legislators to assure that NO dog (or other aggressive animal) in a shelter can be euthanized, other than if it is irremediably suffering, regardless of its violent or even deadly behavioral history. However, it is the goal and purpose of shelters to place as many animals as possible directly into homes with families. This bill went far beyond the purpose of the 1998 Hayden bill which had the intent to restrict euthanasia of healthy and adoptable animals. No one with knowledge of the devastating outcome of attacks by currently popular Pit Bulls, XL and XXL Bullys, now banned in the UK, Wales, Scotland and India, along with other aggressive breeds, nor anyone who has been the victim of any vicious dog attack, could plausibly agree that this risk should be encouraged or can be afforded by the State of California or any governmental jurisdiction. So far, it appears other legislators are skeptical of this bill. The only positive change with which some CA animal control agencies and legislators have expressed mutual agreement is the increase in spay/neuter deposits for dogs and cats being raised to $200 to match the much higher rates for surgical sterilization in today’s economy. A CLOSER LOOK AT AB 2265 In the past few weeks we have seen countries such as England, Wales, Scotland and India joining those which ban Pit Bull, XL and XXL Bullys and other dangerous dogs in order to stop the trafficking of dangerous breeds, provide safety for communities and stop the horrific attacks and deaths of innocent children and adults whose lives are ended by other people’s “protection dogs” or “rescued” pets with a known history of violent behavior. AB 2265 – A RISK CALIFORNIA CANNOT TAKE There is value in telling the truth about dog behavior and the greatest is in public and personal safety. What weird whim—other than personal aggrandizement or a strong campaign supporter—would cause Senator McCarthy to encourage ignoring violent past history and risk human and animal lives on a gamble that a dog with a known history of unprovoked aggression will suddenly act differently? If we want canines to continue to be known as man’s (or woman’s) best friends, we need—just as we do with humans—to assure they have earned that trust by not misusing their innate strength and survival skills to harm those who trust and love them. CHANGING THE STATE’S EUTHANASIA GOAL This bill, AB 2265, introduced on February 8, 2024, drastically changes the State’s animal shelter euthanasia goal—from ending euthanasia of adoptable animals to ending euthanasia of any animal. That includes vicious dogs, wild and/or dangerous animals, prohibited animals and regulated animals. This would create chaotic danger for adopters and pet owners and innocent residents/neighbors throughout California, while ALSO negatively and disastrously affecting the insurance and veterinary industries, according to experts. The only exceptions in the bill that allow a dangerous animal to be euthanized are very narrow categories for medical and behavior issues: 1) those that are irremediably suffering, which is defined as those for which “severe, unremitting physical pain” cannot be relieved by any medical means without regard to cost or local availability of that level of care; and 2) Those that have been declared “vicious” under the State’s regulatory scheme, which few agencies use, and which assumes that a hearing was held after an owner contested that declaration. According to Fast Track Democracy, “Existing law prohibits animals that are irremediably suffering from a serious illness or severe injury from being held for owner redemption or adoption. This bill would instead declare it the policy of the state that no animal be euthanized by a public animal control agency or shelter or a private entity that contracts with a public animal control agency or shelter for animal care and control services, except as provided.” “Existing law prohibits a stray dog or cat impounded by a public or private shelter from being euthanized before 6 business days after the stray dog or cat is impounded, not including the day of impoundment, and requires that the stray dog or cat, except those irremediably suffering, be released to a nonprofit animal rescue or adoption organization before the scheduled euthanasia of the stray dog or cat if requested by the organization, as specified.” The analysis summarizes the Bill (see Fast Track Democracy). Existing law prohibits a stray dog or cat impounded by a public or private shelter from being euthanized before 6 business days after the stray dog or cat is impounded, not including the day of impoundment, and requires that the stray dog or cat, except those irremediably suffering, be released to a nonprofit animal rescue or adoption organization before the scheduled euthanasia of the stray dog or cat if requested by the organization, as specified. WARNINGS ABOUT THIS ‘NO KILL’ PLAN FOR DANGEROUS DOGS A California animal-control specialist offered the following thoughts based on his personal and professional experience. (The following is not to be taken as legal advice, but merely as guidance in further considering some issues that appear to not have been considered in pursuing these severe changes to animal sheltering under existing California laws and practices.) “This Bill would absolutely eviscerate Food and Agricultural Code Section 31683, which allows counties and cities to have their own regulatory process for dangerous dogs, and it would force everyone to use the very-flawed State process.” AND he summarized that:
FUNDRAISING – THE POWER OF THE ALMIGHTY DOLLAR There is no better way to reach the wallets of animal lovers than through their heart strings, and sadly millions of dollars are going into pockets of executives in organizations that do not directly care for or protect animals and, of course, nothing speaks louder than donations at the lobbying and legislative level. But, the needs of homeless animals should not be creating slush funds for campaigns nor playing on the emotions of those who are continually confronted by TV commercials and mailers, saying that just a few more dollars will save them all. There are also human lives and safety to be considered and this is a primary responsibility of animal shelters and humane societies. It is important that they are asked what will help them do this thankless and seemingly hopeless job. Pets are too often obtained as a short-term experience with little commitment and then abandoned within or outside these facilities that do not benefit from the money that is raised by large organizations or politicians ostensibly to help them. Instead, these promises set unreachable goals and promote “feel-good” programs that overburden their staffing and emotions, without asking what they need to do this very difficult job from a realistic perspective. THE BEST INDICATOR OF AN ANIMAL’S FUTURE BEHAVIOR IS ITS PAST Not all animals are adoptable, nor should they be placed in homes where they are likely to harm, or be harmed because certain behavior is endemic to the breed. The AKC thrives on the fact that bloodlines of dogs determine or influence their predictable behavior. Why is it this is so clear that it causes millions of people to buy purebreds for certain reasons; yet, animal shelters are expected to take in dogs with documented histories of anti-social behavior and attacks and rehome them with promises they will be “good family members” just to keep them alive? LISTEN BEFORE VOTING, SACRAMENTO Legislators need to listen to experts in animal control—not self-appointed voices for animals—many of whom have never worked in a shelter, before even considering new legislation. They also need to ask their own community, “Do you feel safe from dog attacks? And/or “have you been a victim of an attack or live in fear of neighborhood animals?” They may be surprised at the number of injuries that have been suffered but didn’t make the press and how many victims may have permanent, life-limiting, disabilities for which they were never compensated. Assembly Member McCarthy needs to walk through animal shelters in his district and ask those who work there or have been long-term volunteers, and those who take the responsibility for determining policies and the endless, sad challenges of management, “what will help you help them?” DON’T WAIT FOR AN IRREVERSIBLE TRAGEDY California has been very liberal (or very foolish) in allowing dogs known to have a history of aggression to be removed from shelters for adoption, but lawsuits and tragic, injuries or deaths of innocent victims have imposed limitations as to what can be tolerated philosophically and financially. The safety of the dog itself must also be a consideration. People understandably react violently to dog attacks, using any weapon to inflict sufficient injury to stop the dog and save their own or another’s life. Euthanasia can be the most humane option when it is indicated or determined that the animal poses a consistent threat to humans or animals in general, or poses a recurrent uncontrollable risk to the public’s and its own safety. (Author’s note: If anyone would like to see more of the informal critique of the proposed CA law AB 2265, quoted in part in this article, you can contact me through the editor of CityWatchLA: ([jim@citywatchla.com](mailto:jim@citywatchla.com).) (Phyllis M. Daugherty is a former Los Angeles City employee, an animal activist and a contributor to CityWatch. |
2024.05.19 06:53 AdInteresting2401 Don't let that bougie doctor get you down mama bear!💪 "Leaky gut"
"There is a test available that shows whether an individual has intestinal permeability. It works by measuring levels of two indigestible sugars, mannitol and lactulose, in the urine. Most physicians do not use this test and research shows that it is not very reliable. As we mentioned earlier, there is no evidence that intestinal permeability causes any disease; be wary of anyone who claims that it does. Some unscrupulous individuals are even selling these tests to consumers online. Using this test to diagnose leaky gut syndrome would be like ordering a test to look for blood in the stool of someone with IBD and using a positive test result to ‘prove’ that the bloody stools caused some other mysterious disease that in turn caused the IBD. We already know that bloody stools are a symptom of Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis, just as we know that intestinal permeability is a symptom of some diseases such as Crohn’s disease and celiac disease.
Proponents of leaky gut syndrome might also misuse tests that look for bacterial, fungal, or viral infections, or tests that measure immune function, to ‘diagnose’ the disorder, when there is no evidence that the results are in any way related to this baseless ‘syndrome’."
"Whatever you hear in the media, the fact remains that there is no quality research to support the existence of ‘leaky gut syndrome’. The situation becomes especially dangerous when you consider that the symptoms associated with this disorder are present in a number of other illnesses, so a quick diagnosis of leaky gut is more likely to leave patients untreated for what really ails them.
Many people are eager to believe that leaky gut syndrome is a valid illness because it seems like an answer to many of their health problems. When you really think about it, one diagnosis that explains arthritis, IBD, skin problems, fatigue, and more seems fictional. Even more unrealistic is that all of these symptoms will go away if the patient just takes a few supplements and avoids certain nutritious foods.
It is important to use critical thinking when faced with a potential diagnosis that isn’t backed by scientific evidence. You have to wonder why there are no reliable studies that show evidence of leaky gut syndrome (especially since it supposedly affects so many individuals), why people are so quick to diagnose an unstudied disorder, and why the only way to ‘treat’ this disease is by taking expensive supplements or modifying your diet to remove multiple food groups.
Many practitioners who diagnose patients with leaky gut syndrome claim that a lack of adequate studies does not mean it doesn’t exist. While this could be possible, diagnosing and treating a disease that we don’t have evidence for can be dangerous, which is why the medical community uses such rigorous testing to scientifically support any new diagnoses, medications, or treatment plans before recommending them to patients."
https://badgut.org/information-centre/a-z-digestive-topics/leaky-gut-syndrome/
submitted by AdInteresting2401 to MCAS_ [link] [comments]
Proponents of leaky gut syndrome might also misuse tests that look for bacterial, fungal, or viral infections, or tests that measure immune function, to ‘diagnose’ the disorder, when there is no evidence that the results are in any way related to this baseless ‘syndrome’."
"Whatever you hear in the media, the fact remains that there is no quality research to support the existence of ‘leaky gut syndrome’. The situation becomes especially dangerous when you consider that the symptoms associated with this disorder are present in a number of other illnesses, so a quick diagnosis of leaky gut is more likely to leave patients untreated for what really ails them.
Many people are eager to believe that leaky gut syndrome is a valid illness because it seems like an answer to many of their health problems. When you really think about it, one diagnosis that explains arthritis, IBD, skin problems, fatigue, and more seems fictional. Even more unrealistic is that all of these symptoms will go away if the patient just takes a few supplements and avoids certain nutritious foods.
It is important to use critical thinking when faced with a potential diagnosis that isn’t backed by scientific evidence. You have to wonder why there are no reliable studies that show evidence of leaky gut syndrome (especially since it supposedly affects so many individuals), why people are so quick to diagnose an unstudied disorder, and why the only way to ‘treat’ this disease is by taking expensive supplements or modifying your diet to remove multiple food groups.
Many practitioners who diagnose patients with leaky gut syndrome claim that a lack of adequate studies does not mean it doesn’t exist. While this could be possible, diagnosing and treating a disease that we don’t have evidence for can be dangerous, which is why the medical community uses such rigorous testing to scientifically support any new diagnoses, medications, or treatment plans before recommending them to patients."
https://badgut.org/information-centre/a-z-digestive-topics/leaky-gut-syndrome/
2024.05.19 06:38 AdInteresting2401 Dying to be ill - How people make it hard for actual sufferers to be taken serious, hard to find any authentic and not misleading information, brain washing people into self diagnoses
"Could the mods please do something about all the posts promoting treatments/causes that haven’t been backed by science? Colloidal silver, untested alternative medicine, anti-vax theories, etc. presented as unequivocally true.
This is supposed to be a science-based sub. Spreading more blatant pseudoscience only gives more fodder to the people who don’t believe MCAS exists."
People that spread the internet without an official diagnosis or any prove of an mast cell involvement, antihistamines are used for multiple diseases. There have been people that think they have MCAS because Cromolyn helped their asthma, H1 medication helped their urticaria, or H2 helped their heartburn. These medications are all widely used and are rather "off label" used for MCAS. That is why all 3 criteria need to be present.
Websites present various doctors that claim to be "specialists" and who give out diagnoses to anyone based of unspecific symptoms, reportedly these do not even make tests at all. Or use unvalidated biomarkers or questionable diagnostic criteria. Cash is payed upfront.
People who actually have a serious and rare disease named MCAS, struggle to be taken seriously, because many doctors are fed up by the sheer amount of psychic conspicuous patients, who only want a proof for their google based self diagnoses. Often times there is no proof and these people make a burden for health care resources.
Mast cell medication is free and if you have no relief at all with antihistamines, MCAS is very unlikely. There is not much any further medication that someone would get, if not presented with serious reactions, most of the times anaphylaxis. Ketotifen and cromolyn are also mainly antihistamines, still many gaslight themselfs thinking that that is the medication they need.
Primary and secondary MCAS are easy to rule out, due to specific and severe symptoms and quite obvious underlying mechanism like an IgE dependant allergy or the genetic mutation. The diagnosis that is under question is the idiopathic MCAS, where the underlying mechanism is unknown, these people still need to fullfill the diagnostic markers, but in reality this happens only rarely.
Still many think they have a secondary MCAS, it is said by certain authors that a secondary MCAS would have a prevalance of 17-30 per cent. They say that long covid and/or T-Cells are the problem. That this would be quite easy to proof if it would be happening they do not care about. That this has already been evaluated they do not care about. The desperate patients are easy to convince it seems.
Some people even make claim their MCAS would be due to a root cause of "Sibo", "Leaky gut" or "microbiome disbalance", all which are unrelated to a MCAS and heavenly overdiagnosed or not even proven to excist, just like the whole hEDS and POTS misdiagnoses going on. Mast cells in the gut have been studied and people with IBS have had no success with mast cell treatment.
It is also a burden for patients, knowing that even some doctors do not stick to authentic measures and give out misinformation. Maybe because of a conflict of interest? Since most internet posts that come up include misinformation, it is hard for sufferers to find alike. MCAS communities are full of people who do not have MCAS. MCAS sufferers have no community right now.
.
"My blood and 24hr urine collection testing came back normal. The allergist I saw also told me outright he doubted I had MCAS (a fad diagnosis along with EDS and POTS, as he said) but did end up suggesting I come back to get samples tested during an episode. I was so frustrated with the allergist that I’ve never gone through with that. Instead my amazing primary doctor decided to prescribe me montelukast and monitor my reaction to trialing antihistamines at home, and I had immediate positive response! We also first ruled out everything else he could think of and clearly test for; my main symptom is facial flushing so I had things like lupus and carcinoid syndrome ruled out.
Although we treat it as such, I don’t actually have an “official” MCAS diagnosis on my chart. IME the specialists who do inquire about all my meds or listen to my symptoms don’t seem to differentiate between MCAS and allergies/sensitivities anyway :/ but my case isn’t super severe and currently well-controlled so that works for me. Good luck to you - I hope you find proper care regardless of your test results!"
.
"I have normal tryptase levels and definitely have MCAS. They diagnosed it after POTS, and it was mostly based on symptoms as well as the “scratch test”"
.
"Spoke about it with my GP, she referred me to an internal medicine doc who specializes in MCAS. I told him my symptoms and he went “yep that sounds like MCAS” and proceeded to literally dump an armful of antihistamine samples into my lap and bounce off to his next appointment. I am definitely in the minority of people whose experience was that easy. It was so easy that I almost don’t believe him."
.
"This is the same as my experience! Walked in, diagnosed by rheumatologist in 5 mins based off symptoms and loaded up with antihistamines as a starting point. No testing or anything."
.
"went to my allergist and had the blood work panel done. nothing in it came back weird, but my allergist is treating me as if i have MCAS based on all my symptoms and pictures of flares."
.
"Went in to get my pots diagnosis and the doctor was like “btw your blood tests show you have mast cell activation syndrome” and then gave me some medicine and did not elaborate further"
"As it turned out my diagnosis was literally not true. I don’t have MCAS (and even if i did what they gave me for it was beyond overkill) after talking to an actual allergist I believe that most likely I was given an extra diagnosis on extremely weak basis. Using something from what they saw in my blood so they could bill higher and prescribe more medicine to me. I no longer go to that practice and instead go to a different cardiologist and actively do not recommend going there. Unfortunately this stopped me for years from properly treating my pain as I was trying to treat it on the basis it was being caused by MCAS :/"
.
"Mine was actually fairly easy when I finally figured out it was MCAS.
Got referred to immunology to rule out mastocytosis. Then my PCP at the time did a clinical diagnosis. She wasn’t risking putting me into anaphylaxis to maybe get a positive result on any of the mast cell mediator labs (this doctor was one who didn’t list a diagnosis unless she was confident it isn’t anything else and spent 8 years trying to get an answer).
My current doctors don’t question it because my symptoms at this point line up perfectly with MCAS."
submitted by AdInteresting2401 to MCAS_ [link] [comments]
This is supposed to be a science-based sub. Spreading more blatant pseudoscience only gives more fodder to the people who don’t believe MCAS exists."
People that spread the internet without an official diagnosis or any prove of an mast cell involvement, antihistamines are used for multiple diseases. There have been people that think they have MCAS because Cromolyn helped their asthma, H1 medication helped their urticaria, or H2 helped their heartburn. These medications are all widely used and are rather "off label" used for MCAS. That is why all 3 criteria need to be present.
Websites present various doctors that claim to be "specialists" and who give out diagnoses to anyone based of unspecific symptoms, reportedly these do not even make tests at all. Or use unvalidated biomarkers or questionable diagnostic criteria. Cash is payed upfront.
People who actually have a serious and rare disease named MCAS, struggle to be taken seriously, because many doctors are fed up by the sheer amount of psychic conspicuous patients, who only want a proof for their google based self diagnoses. Often times there is no proof and these people make a burden for health care resources.
Mast cell medication is free and if you have no relief at all with antihistamines, MCAS is very unlikely. There is not much any further medication that someone would get, if not presented with serious reactions, most of the times anaphylaxis. Ketotifen and cromolyn are also mainly antihistamines, still many gaslight themselfs thinking that that is the medication they need.
Primary and secondary MCAS are easy to rule out, due to specific and severe symptoms and quite obvious underlying mechanism like an IgE dependant allergy or the genetic mutation. The diagnosis that is under question is the idiopathic MCAS, where the underlying mechanism is unknown, these people still need to fullfill the diagnostic markers, but in reality this happens only rarely.
Still many think they have a secondary MCAS, it is said by certain authors that a secondary MCAS would have a prevalance of 17-30 per cent. They say that long covid and/or T-Cells are the problem. That this would be quite easy to proof if it would be happening they do not care about. That this has already been evaluated they do not care about. The desperate patients are easy to convince it seems.
Some people even make claim their MCAS would be due to a root cause of "Sibo", "Leaky gut" or "microbiome disbalance", all which are unrelated to a MCAS and heavenly overdiagnosed or not even proven to excist, just like the whole hEDS and POTS misdiagnoses going on. Mast cells in the gut have been studied and people with IBS have had no success with mast cell treatment.
It is also a burden for patients, knowing that even some doctors do not stick to authentic measures and give out misinformation. Maybe because of a conflict of interest? Since most internet posts that come up include misinformation, it is hard for sufferers to find alike. MCAS communities are full of people who do not have MCAS. MCAS sufferers have no community right now.
.
"My blood and 24hr urine collection testing came back normal. The allergist I saw also told me outright he doubted I had MCAS (a fad diagnosis along with EDS and POTS, as he said) but did end up suggesting I come back to get samples tested during an episode. I was so frustrated with the allergist that I’ve never gone through with that. Instead my amazing primary doctor decided to prescribe me montelukast and monitor my reaction to trialing antihistamines at home, and I had immediate positive response! We also first ruled out everything else he could think of and clearly test for; my main symptom is facial flushing so I had things like lupus and carcinoid syndrome ruled out.
Although we treat it as such, I don’t actually have an “official” MCAS diagnosis on my chart. IME the specialists who do inquire about all my meds or listen to my symptoms don’t seem to differentiate between MCAS and allergies/sensitivities anyway :/ but my case isn’t super severe and currently well-controlled so that works for me. Good luck to you - I hope you find proper care regardless of your test results!"
.
"I have normal tryptase levels and definitely have MCAS. They diagnosed it after POTS, and it was mostly based on symptoms as well as the “scratch test”"
.
"Spoke about it with my GP, she referred me to an internal medicine doc who specializes in MCAS. I told him my symptoms and he went “yep that sounds like MCAS” and proceeded to literally dump an armful of antihistamine samples into my lap and bounce off to his next appointment. I am definitely in the minority of people whose experience was that easy. It was so easy that I almost don’t believe him."
.
"This is the same as my experience! Walked in, diagnosed by rheumatologist in 5 mins based off symptoms and loaded up with antihistamines as a starting point. No testing or anything."
.
"went to my allergist and had the blood work panel done. nothing in it came back weird, but my allergist is treating me as if i have MCAS based on all my symptoms and pictures of flares."
.
"Went in to get my pots diagnosis and the doctor was like “btw your blood tests show you have mast cell activation syndrome” and then gave me some medicine and did not elaborate further"
"As it turned out my diagnosis was literally not true. I don’t have MCAS (and even if i did what they gave me for it was beyond overkill) after talking to an actual allergist I believe that most likely I was given an extra diagnosis on extremely weak basis. Using something from what they saw in my blood so they could bill higher and prescribe more medicine to me. I no longer go to that practice and instead go to a different cardiologist and actively do not recommend going there. Unfortunately this stopped me for years from properly treating my pain as I was trying to treat it on the basis it was being caused by MCAS :/"
.
"Mine was actually fairly easy when I finally figured out it was MCAS.
Got referred to immunology to rule out mastocytosis. Then my PCP at the time did a clinical diagnosis. She wasn’t risking putting me into anaphylaxis to maybe get a positive result on any of the mast cell mediator labs (this doctor was one who didn’t list a diagnosis unless she was confident it isn’t anything else and spent 8 years trying to get an answer).
My current doctors don’t question it because my symptoms at this point line up perfectly with MCAS."
2024.05.19 06:19 Rainyfriedtofu Clover Assistant vs Epic and the tale of Peter Part 1.
Hello Fellow Apes,
In my recent posts, there were discussions regarding how Clover Assistant will compete with Epic EHEMR in the future, and someone asked about how CA can make EMR better. To understand this thesis, we're going to start by looking at the two offering in a table. It's going to be a long one.
With the comparison between Epic and Clover Assistant clarified, let's delve into the history of Epic Systems Corporation. Founded in 1979 by Judith R. Faulkner, Epic started as a small company focused on developing database management systems for healthcare. Initially, it faced several challenges, but these obstacles helped shape its pivotal role in the healthcare industry.
Epic's first product was Chronicles, a clinical database management system designed to handle patient records and clinical data. This foundational product set the stage for the more comprehensive EHR systems Epic would later develop. Notably, Epic adopted a client-server architecture early on, which was advanced for its time. This technology allowed multiple users to access and update patient records simultaneously, significantly improving efficiency and collaboration in healthcare settings.
In its early years, Epic primarily catered to small to mid-sized healthcare organizations, including hospitals and clinics. The potential to streamline operations and improve patient care through better data management attracted these early adopters. Epic's readiness to customize its software to meet the specific needs of each client helped build strong relationships and loyalty among its early customers.
One significant challenge Epic faced was integrating its systems with the existing healthcare infrastructure. Many healthcare providers operated disparate systems that did not easily communicate with each other. Epic addressed this by evolving into one of the leading providers of EHR systems, gradually expanding into almost every healthcare system. As Epic's client base grew, the company had to ensure its systems could scale to handle larger volumes of data and more complex operations.
From the outset, Epic focused on designing systems that were user-friendly and tailored to the workflows of healthcare professionals. This emphasis on usability set it apart from competitors. The company also invested heavily in developing standards for data exchange and interoperability, which later became crucial as the healthcare industry moved towards more integrated and connected systems.
Epic's success stories from early clients built a strong reputation in the healthcare industry, helping to attract new customers. The company formed partnerships with academic medical centers, which drove innovation and provided a platform for testing and refining new features. Epic continuously reinvested in research and development, ensuring its products remained at the cutting edge of technology and met the evolving needs of healthcare providers. The robust customer support system, including extensive training programs for users, was vital for successful implementations and fostering long-term customer relationships.
Epic played a significant role in setting standards for electronic health records and healthcare IT. Its systems helped drive the adoption of standardized practices across the industry. Early implementations of Epic's systems demonstrated significant improvements in operational efficiency, reducing administrative burdens and allowing healthcare providers to focus more on patient care.
Moving forward, the healthcare industry recognizes that the new frontier is based on a strong foundation of social determinants of health and preventative medicine. With that said, it is evident that Epic has built a comprehensive platform that covers various aspects of healthcare management. Starting as merely an EHR company, Epic has added numerous features, setting a precedent that newer entrants like Clover Assistant are following. Clover Assistant, an AI clinical support tool, aims to modernize EHR usage by helping physicians process data with speed and accuracy not possible by a normal human. In the future, just like Epic, Clover Assistant is expected to add more features. The key differentiators moving forward will likely be cost, compliance with evolving standards like CMS-HCC V28, and adaptability to policy changes.
Currently, the estimated cost for implementing Epic is:
Peter Kuipers is a seasoned financial executive with over 25 years of experience in technology leadership. He has held senior financial roles in various prominent companies, including Omnicell, Quantcast Corporation, The Weather Company, Yahoo!, Altera Corporation, General Electric, and Akzo Nobel. Before joining Clov, Peter served as the Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at Omnicell, a healthcare technology company focused on medication and supply management solutions. He joined Omnicell in August 2015 and played a crucial role in the company's financial and strategic development. During his tenure at Omnicell, Kuipers contributed significantly to the company's growth, helping to increase its revenue from $485 million to $1.3 billion. His responsibilities extended beyond the traditional CFO role, as he also oversaw global supply chain and manufacturing, information technology, international business, corporate development, and mergers and acquisitions. His efforts were pivotal in transforming Omnicell into a leader in cloud-based platforms and SaaS/Tech-Enabled Services for the healthcare industry. He also oversaw various strategic initiatives, including international business expansion and mergers and acquisitions, contributing to Omnicell's global reach and market leadership.
I became aware of Peter Kuipers and Omnicell because Upsetweekend's company, along with many others, shifted from using Pyxis Oncology to Omnicell. Initially, Pyxis Oncology offered superior tools and services. However, during Peter's tenure at Omnicell, not only did the company offer more cost-effective solutions, but it also began to provide superior services. Securing Peter as a CFO for Clover was quite a coup, and it's impressive that they managed to attract such a seasoned executive to a smaller, less established company. Given his extensive experience and track record, Peter is well-equipped to strategically price and market Clover Assistant (CA). His expertise will likely be pivotal in attracting early adopters and expanding the company's operations. Just look at Omincell's stock price during his tenure.
https://www.tradingview.com/symbols/NASDAQ-OMCL/
At their core, both Clover Assistant (CA) and Epic are tools designed for electronic health record (EHR) management. They facilitate the presentation of data to physicians, enabling them to devise accurate treatment plans. However, there are notable differences between the two systems, primarily driven by their technological foundations and target functionalities.
Clover Assistant: This is a relatively new tool that integrates artificial intelligence (AI) to process EHR data, aiming to simplify and enhance the efficiency of physicians' work. The use of AI allows Clover Assistant to offer advanced data analysis, potentially providing more insightful recommendations and support for clinical decisions.
Epic: As an older and more established EHR system, Epic has a broad user base and is deeply integrated into many healthcare institutions' workflows. While it is built on an older technological framework, it is robust and extensively supports various healthcare operations from patient records management to billing.
The analogy of video game development is apt for comparing these systems. Imagine Epic as a game built on an earlier version of the Unreal Engine, while Clover Assistant is akin to a game developed on Unreal Engine 5. The newer engine (or in this case, the newer AI-driven platform of Clover Assistant) offers enhanced capabilities, such as better processing power and more advanced features, which may not be as optimized in the older system used by Epic.
As Clover Assistant gains traction and proves its efficacy and cost-efficiency, it could start to compete more directly with Epic, especially if it continues to attract positive feedback from early adopters. This competition could push both platforms to continuously innovate and improve, potentially leading to better EHR management tools available to healthcare providers.
In summary, while both tools serve the fundamental purpose of managing health records and aiding treatment planning, their underlying technologies and approaches to handling data greatly influence their capabilities and potential impact on the healthcare industry.
*Update* I forgot to delete the title, but there will not be a part 2. I'm tired ^_^
submitted by Rainyfriedtofu to Healthcare_Anon [link] [comments]
In my recent posts, there were discussions regarding how Clover Assistant will compete with Epic EHEMR in the future, and someone asked about how CA can make EMR better. To understand this thesis, we're going to start by looking at the two offering in a table. It's going to be a long one.
| Clover Assistant | Epic |
|---|---|
| Clover Assistant is a clinical support tool designed by Clover Health, a health insurance company. It aims to help physicians make more informed decisions by providing them with actionable insights at the point of care. The tool integrates data from various sources to present a comprehensive view of a patient's health, aiming to improve outcomes and streamline care delivery. At the moment, CA has the capacity to integrate with Epic. CA is primarily focuses on enhancing clinical decision-making by providing insights and recommendations based on data analysis. It is designed to complement existing EHR. However, in the future I think CA will break away from this, and we will go into more detail when we look at the history of Epic. | Epic Systems Corporation provides one of the most widely used electronic health record (EHR) systems in the United States and globally. Epic EHR is a comprehensive platform that covers various aspects of healthcare management, including patient records, scheduling, billing, and clinical workflows. Epic is a full-fledged EHR system that manages all aspects of patient care and hospital administration. It includes modules for clinical workflows, patient scheduling, billing, and etc. CA isn't at this level yet. |
| CA is designed to integrate with various EHR systems, providing a layer of intelligence on top of existing workflows. Its goal is to enhance the data already present in the EHRs with additional insights. It does so by aggregating data from multiple sources, including claims data, lab results, and patient-reported information. It uses this data to offer real-time recommendations and insights to physicians. Additionally, it offers insights in a concise, actionable format to help physicians quickly make informed decisions. We don't know what the cost of CA implementation will be, but I know 100% it will be cheaper than Epic, and in the future it will have the same features as Epic. | Epic is known for its interoperability through the use of standards like HL7 and FHIR, allowing it to connect with other systems and share data across different healthcare providers and organizations. It collects and stores a wide range of clinical and administrative data. While it offers decision support tools, its primary function is data management and workflow facilitation. However, there are a lot of manual work involved for those who use this because it is an older system. While functional, Epic is often criticized for its complexity and steep learning curve. However, it is also praised for its extensive customization options, allowing organizations to tailor the system to their specific needs. The biggest problem with Epic is it is known for its high implementation costs and resource-intensive deployment process. However, it advertises itself as a comprehensive solution that can manage all aspects of healthcare operations. |
Epic's first product was Chronicles, a clinical database management system designed to handle patient records and clinical data. This foundational product set the stage for the more comprehensive EHR systems Epic would later develop. Notably, Epic adopted a client-server architecture early on, which was advanced for its time. This technology allowed multiple users to access and update patient records simultaneously, significantly improving efficiency and collaboration in healthcare settings.
In its early years, Epic primarily catered to small to mid-sized healthcare organizations, including hospitals and clinics. The potential to streamline operations and improve patient care through better data management attracted these early adopters. Epic's readiness to customize its software to meet the specific needs of each client helped build strong relationships and loyalty among its early customers.
One significant challenge Epic faced was integrating its systems with the existing healthcare infrastructure. Many healthcare providers operated disparate systems that did not easily communicate with each other. Epic addressed this by evolving into one of the leading providers of EHR systems, gradually expanding into almost every healthcare system. As Epic's client base grew, the company had to ensure its systems could scale to handle larger volumes of data and more complex operations.
From the outset, Epic focused on designing systems that were user-friendly and tailored to the workflows of healthcare professionals. This emphasis on usability set it apart from competitors. The company also invested heavily in developing standards for data exchange and interoperability, which later became crucial as the healthcare industry moved towards more integrated and connected systems.
Epic's success stories from early clients built a strong reputation in the healthcare industry, helping to attract new customers. The company formed partnerships with academic medical centers, which drove innovation and provided a platform for testing and refining new features. Epic continuously reinvested in research and development, ensuring its products remained at the cutting edge of technology and met the evolving needs of healthcare providers. The robust customer support system, including extensive training programs for users, was vital for successful implementations and fostering long-term customer relationships.
Epic played a significant role in setting standards for electronic health records and healthcare IT. Its systems helped drive the adoption of standardized practices across the industry. Early implementations of Epic's systems demonstrated significant improvements in operational efficiency, reducing administrative burdens and allowing healthcare providers to focus more on patient care.
Moving forward, the healthcare industry recognizes that the new frontier is based on a strong foundation of social determinants of health and preventative medicine. With that said, it is evident that Epic has built a comprehensive platform that covers various aspects of healthcare management. Starting as merely an EHR company, Epic has added numerous features, setting a precedent that newer entrants like Clover Assistant are following. Clover Assistant, an AI clinical support tool, aims to modernize EHR usage by helping physicians process data with speed and accuracy not possible by a normal human. In the future, just like Epic, Clover Assistant is expected to add more features. The key differentiators moving forward will likely be cost, compliance with evolving standards like CMS-HCC V28, and adaptability to policy changes.
Currently, the estimated cost for implementing Epic is:
- Large Health Systems and Hospitals: Total costs (including initial and ongoing) for large implementations can range from $100 million to $1 billion, depending on the size and complexity of the organization.
- Mid-sized Hospitals: Mid-sized hospitals might spend between $30 million and $50 million.
- Small Hospitals and Private Practices: Smaller hospitals and private practices typically spend significantly less. Through programs like Epic's Community Connect, the costs can be reduced, making it feasible for smaller entities to adopt Epic’s EHR system. Costs for smaller practices might range from $1 million to $5 million. Who the fuck has this kind of money as a private practice?
Peter Kuipers is a seasoned financial executive with over 25 years of experience in technology leadership. He has held senior financial roles in various prominent companies, including Omnicell, Quantcast Corporation, The Weather Company, Yahoo!, Altera Corporation, General Electric, and Akzo Nobel. Before joining Clov, Peter served as the Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at Omnicell, a healthcare technology company focused on medication and supply management solutions. He joined Omnicell in August 2015 and played a crucial role in the company's financial and strategic development. During his tenure at Omnicell, Kuipers contributed significantly to the company's growth, helping to increase its revenue from $485 million to $1.3 billion. His responsibilities extended beyond the traditional CFO role, as he also oversaw global supply chain and manufacturing, information technology, international business, corporate development, and mergers and acquisitions. His efforts were pivotal in transforming Omnicell into a leader in cloud-based platforms and SaaS/Tech-Enabled Services for the healthcare industry. He also oversaw various strategic initiatives, including international business expansion and mergers and acquisitions, contributing to Omnicell's global reach and market leadership.
I became aware of Peter Kuipers and Omnicell because Upsetweekend's company, along with many others, shifted from using Pyxis Oncology to Omnicell. Initially, Pyxis Oncology offered superior tools and services. However, during Peter's tenure at Omnicell, not only did the company offer more cost-effective solutions, but it also began to provide superior services. Securing Peter as a CFO for Clover was quite a coup, and it's impressive that they managed to attract such a seasoned executive to a smaller, less established company. Given his extensive experience and track record, Peter is well-equipped to strategically price and market Clover Assistant (CA). His expertise will likely be pivotal in attracting early adopters and expanding the company's operations. Just look at Omincell's stock price during his tenure.
https://www.tradingview.com/symbols/NASDAQ-OMCL/
At their core, both Clover Assistant (CA) and Epic are tools designed for electronic health record (EHR) management. They facilitate the presentation of data to physicians, enabling them to devise accurate treatment plans. However, there are notable differences between the two systems, primarily driven by their technological foundations and target functionalities.
Clover Assistant: This is a relatively new tool that integrates artificial intelligence (AI) to process EHR data, aiming to simplify and enhance the efficiency of physicians' work. The use of AI allows Clover Assistant to offer advanced data analysis, potentially providing more insightful recommendations and support for clinical decisions.
Epic: As an older and more established EHR system, Epic has a broad user base and is deeply integrated into many healthcare institutions' workflows. While it is built on an older technological framework, it is robust and extensively supports various healthcare operations from patient records management to billing.
The analogy of video game development is apt for comparing these systems. Imagine Epic as a game built on an earlier version of the Unreal Engine, while Clover Assistant is akin to a game developed on Unreal Engine 5. The newer engine (or in this case, the newer AI-driven platform of Clover Assistant) offers enhanced capabilities, such as better processing power and more advanced features, which may not be as optimized in the older system used by Epic.
As Clover Assistant gains traction and proves its efficacy and cost-efficiency, it could start to compete more directly with Epic, especially if it continues to attract positive feedback from early adopters. This competition could push both platforms to continuously innovate and improve, potentially leading to better EHR management tools available to healthcare providers.
In summary, while both tools serve the fundamental purpose of managing health records and aiding treatment planning, their underlying technologies and approaches to handling data greatly influence their capabilities and potential impact on the healthcare industry.
*Update* I forgot to delete the title, but there will not be a part 2. I'm tired ^_^
2024.05.19 03:52 skundrik Are American hospitals run like businesse. If yes, how can US hospitals also accept donations?
I keep watching American medical shows and at one point, there is always a a character who points out that US hospitals are run like a business and should be turning a profit. Are they actually businesses? Do they have shareholders and investors? Are they expected to generate profit? And if yes, how on Earth could they ever request donations? Last time I checked, it wasn’t usual practice to give free money to corporations.
Edit: thank you for all the answers, but I guess what I am asking is not whether it is legal to give money as a donation to something that is geared to making profits, but why someone would consider giving money to an entity where any extra money, the profit, would be given to shareholders and investors. Doesn’t it bother people knowing that what they donated to a hospital could end up in some millionaire’s pocket as part of his reward for investing in a hospital?
submitted by skundrik to NoStupidQuestions [link] [comments]
Edit: thank you for all the answers, but I guess what I am asking is not whether it is legal to give money as a donation to something that is geared to making profits, but why someone would consider giving money to an entity where any extra money, the profit, would be given to shareholders and investors. Doesn’t it bother people knowing that what they donated to a hospital could end up in some millionaire’s pocket as part of his reward for investing in a hospital?
2024.05.19 03:07 yourmaxiemaxie what is it like working 2 jobs? what are your hours?
hello, i'm turning 14 this summer and starting to stress immensely about my future and getting a job and attempting to stay somewhere at-least somewhat comfortable once i'm an adult, and having two jobs seems to be what i may do, but i'm curious about what that's like.
a few questions i have are: what are your hours/how does your day go? how do you handle taxes with the two jobs? are most jobs okay with you having a second or is it rather difficult to find somewhere okay with it? how do you handle if one of your jobs wants overtime? if you're sort of young with 2 jobs, is it possible to maybe buy a small house (1-2 bedrooms) soon w/ how much you're earning?
a few ideas i've had for my jobs are medical billing/coding, just managing medical records, being a front office representative/medical receptionist, then also doing amazon flex, waitressing, and usps. my options are after either very minimal research or my mother's encouragement, i'm planning to do my research on those jobs this summer. i'm curious if these jobs are flexible and good when working two jobs. additionally, i'd love to start a band but that'd be pretty hard so unless somehow its successful it couldn't take much of my time as an adult and i understand.
also, if this is important, my parents do want me out of the house at 18, and i'm in arizona. so yeah, if anybody can answer my questions i would greatly appreciate it! sorry if i don't make much sense or if i'm in the wrong place, i'm a bit tired and confused with reddit. again, thank you.
submitted by yourmaxiemaxie to personalfinance [link] [comments]
a few questions i have are: what are your hours/how does your day go? how do you handle taxes with the two jobs? are most jobs okay with you having a second or is it rather difficult to find somewhere okay with it? how do you handle if one of your jobs wants overtime? if you're sort of young with 2 jobs, is it possible to maybe buy a small house (1-2 bedrooms) soon w/ how much you're earning?
a few ideas i've had for my jobs are medical billing/coding, just managing medical records, being a front office representative/medical receptionist, then also doing amazon flex, waitressing, and usps. my options are after either very minimal research or my mother's encouragement, i'm planning to do my research on those jobs this summer. i'm curious if these jobs are flexible and good when working two jobs. additionally, i'd love to start a band but that'd be pretty hard so unless somehow its successful it couldn't take much of my time as an adult and i understand.
also, if this is important, my parents do want me out of the house at 18, and i'm in arizona. so yeah, if anybody can answer my questions i would greatly appreciate it! sorry if i don't make much sense or if i'm in the wrong place, i'm a bit tired and confused with reddit. again, thank you.
2024.05.19 01:45 GARVITREDIT Personal Statement for CS/engineering people
Hey Everyone!
I am a Bioinformatics major and computer science minor. I was wondering if anyone is in/ was in a similar boat and how they incorporated their CS experiences into answering the question "why do you want to be a doctor? ". Personally, I was thinking my overall message/theme to be something along the lines of: "wanting to innovate the medical field using my CS knowledge to help patients". But I am afraid that doesnt 100% answer the main prompt of the personal statement.
How did you guys deal with this? Just for an example, in my lab, I wrote code which helped us analyze Alzheimer's data more efficently. Wondering how I can relate experiences such as these to answering why I want to be a doctor? Idk if I am overthinking things but any advice is helpful!
submitted by GARVITREDIT to premed [link] [comments]
I am a Bioinformatics major and computer science minor. I was wondering if anyone is in/ was in a similar boat and how they incorporated their CS experiences into answering the question "why do you want to be a doctor? ". Personally, I was thinking my overall message/theme to be something along the lines of: "wanting to innovate the medical field using my CS knowledge to help patients". But I am afraid that doesnt 100% answer the main prompt of the personal statement.
How did you guys deal with this? Just for an example, in my lab, I wrote code which helped us analyze Alzheimer's data more efficently. Wondering how I can relate experiences such as these to answering why I want to be a doctor? Idk if I am overthinking things but any advice is helpful!
2024.05.19 01:06 guiltyofnothing “Do you comment on Reddit to be an annoying middle child?” Slapfights rage and insults fly as /r/BoomersBeingFools debates if boomers don’t eat enough food
The Context:
A user posts to /BoomersBeingFools wondering if boomers don’t eat enough and are “starving” themselves, and by extension pushing their expectations unfairly onto others.Many users quickly take issue with OOP’s premise. The discussion quickly devolves into multiple slapfights, insults over weight, and the war in Gaza.
The Drama:
Does metabolism change as people age?People commenting it’s cause they’re older and don’t need to eat as much. Yes, I know that could be a part of it, but let’s be honest, it’s mostly them just being judgy/brainwashed by diet culture/think it’s absurd to spend money on eating out…[Continued:]
"Brainwashed by diet culture" ah so in other words you are obese and need to eat a lot and probably deeply into healthy at any size/fat acceptance.
No they just know they don't need 5000 calori3s a day to exist.
I’m obese for wanting to eat some lunch and dinner? 🤯
No I say that because of "brainwashed by diet culture" there's exactly one group that talks like that.
You must not get out much
I do actually it's how I maintain not being fat. Limiting calories to under 2500 and being outside moving a lot.[Continued:]
I lost 140 pounds by eating more. 🤷 starving myself led to weight gain.
I'm sure you eat more but less calories in total. No one increases their calories and losses sorry.
You're wrong. Instunted my metabolism and my body was holding on to the weight to protect me.
I was eating skinless baked chicken and plain broccoli for 2 years and could not lose weight. I was sick and exhausted but worked out all the time.
Started eating carbs and the weight came melting off.
Sorry :)
For sure. Thats why all the body builders are morbidly obese. They eat chicken and broccoli and their body just goes into starvation mode and holds all the fat. Same with like the concentration camps. All those poor morbidly obese starving people. Once we saved them and fed them the weight just shed off. It's the craziest thing.[…]
It's almost like bodies are different, user name doesn't check out, a nerd would know that 🤔
Whatever you need to tell yourself.
i guess the law of thermodymanics doesnt apply to you.[…]
You should get studied. Defying the laws of thermodynamics is pretty impressive!
Tell me you see someone fat in the store and cringe inside/judge them for no reason without ever speaking to them without telling me 😂[Continued:]
You dislike/hate fat people for the horrid crime of being fat when they don't think about you at all and haven't ever wronged you in any way at all.
Also, I can tell you have never struggled with your weight in the past due to not giving a shit how hating random people for looking a certain way effects them. That, or you did struggle once, and bought into the haters telling you you were worth less based on the number on the scale, in which case I am sorry you believe that.
Dude I was 350lbs at my heaviest. People love saying "oh he says weightloss is eat less move more? Clearly he wants to genocide fat people" but no that's not it at all. I lost tons and most of the people around me went from morbid obesity to overweight or a normal weight. We changed our lifestyles and got in shape. The people that didn't lose weight claim all kinds of medical issues but none of them changed their diet and not of them want to work out. It's pretty clear how to lose weight. That's all.
No more no less no hate.
Wanna know how I know you're a liar or incredibly ignorant of how you come off?
You say you don't dislike them but make fun of their physical disabilities like it's funny. It's not funny. You're making fun of them. It's not funny to make fun of people for having disabilities or for how they look. You perpetuate hate against them that makes them feel like crap for being alive. I don't care about your spiel about medical issues or dieting in general or the fat acceptance movement. When you make fun of disabled people who have trouble walking i'm going to call you out on it. That's exactly what you did. Whether they're fat or not I refuse to make fun of people for that.
I have never made fun of a single person. Only a movement that claims you can be healthy at any size. You can't be vastly under or over weight and be healthy.
Whatever you say buddy. Keep on making fun of people because they can't walk or cope some more that it wasn't directed at a specific person. Have fun with that.
Shut the fuck up fattyInsults are made, ending with accusations of sockpuppeting:
I don't think you realize how pathetic you sound. When my jaw was broken I went 6 weeks without solid food and I'm sitting here rolling my eyes at your propensity for letting your stomach color your opinions of other people. I'd bet dollars to dimes that your body mass index is over 30.[Continued:]
Hey.
You should know:
It costs $0 to not be a dick.
I'll pay that cover charge any day of the week. Especially when I'm dealing with a major league dipshit like [Candy_cane999]Wow, you’re disgusting. It’s not that deep
Radagast was brown, nerd.
Says the person here gossiping about their relative's metabolism. "Not that deep" lol you made a judgment about an entire generation of people because your family member wasn't hungry..lol fuck off
I bet you are high as a kite right now from all the users here agreeing with you, even if they haven't a fucking clue what they are talking about.
Seriously, though, how fat are you? I'm guessing fat enough that you can't hide that stomach roll when you sit down.
High as a kite? Huh? Relax weirdo, it’s just Reddit
You still haven't told us how fat you are.Damn this guy hates fat people !
I used to be one.
So now you just hate fat people for fun?[…]
People with no self control, ESPECIALLY when that self control would benefit their health, are people who are functionally useless as human beings. They are the pieces of shit who would hoard food while everyone else is starving.
It ain't for fun.
Do you comment on Reddit to be an annoying middle child?
Ahhh yes. The fat people are useless excuse. Okay bud have fun out there!
It seems you have to self control over your feelings little guy. Go out there and practice some self control!
Bitter, party of one.
Get a life, chill[Continued:]
😂sounds like you’re projecting. What’s it like still living in your boomer mom’s basement?Get a life, chillAh yes, the mating call of people who "have lives"...ohhhhhh the irony.
lol "projecting", I see you have your masters in Reddit psychology.
What’s it like still living in your boomer mom’s basement?Oooooof, sounds like someone is...................................................................................projecting.
You do realize calling someone fat is the easiest most insecure insult to throw out there. Classic textbook. Hypocrite
I used to be fat as fuck, 270lbs at 5'10. I'll judge you fatties all I damn well please.
You keep avoiding answering the question. You're a landwhale, aren't you?
Ahha! There it is. It’s because you hate yourself. Hope you’re in therapy
The more you avoid this the more we know what kind of person we are dealing with.[…]
You talk shit about people who have self control to excuse how fat and disgusting you are.
Dude why admit that, all you are showing is that you had become really fat, and rather than learn a healthy relationship with food even at that extreme point, you just chose to hate food in general. You took the easy way out because nobody ever taught you portion control. Your loss I guess.[…]
I admit it because I was raised in a home where I couldn't get up until my plate was clean and my mother made sure there were never leftovers that way. I admit it because it is the truth and I don't lie or omit details to make myself sound better. I admit it to show I can relate to being a fatfuck. I admit it because being fat is a choice.
”why would you say something true about yourself!?" - if that isn't Reddit-in-a-nutshell I don't know what is.
I'm just saying it makes you look like you just hated yourself and were pushing that onto another person that may or may not have a healthier relationship with food than you, that's all.
They didn't answer did they?Then, there’s this:
After several attempts they've avoided even talking about their fat stores and are now trying the victim angle.
No doubt. Fatty McFat Fat can't comprehend people not being addicted to constant feedings.
Reddit in a nutshell.
Bro's talking to himself on an alt
OP is a fat fuckOne user thinks they’re speaking uncomfortable truths:
As a former fatass this was my immediate thought
I knew as soon as he said road trip to FloridaFor wanting lunch and dinner? You’re sick
They’re someone whos whole identity is shoving food in their mouth. Look at their username
Eat shit.
If StandardSafe isn’t willing to say it again, I will: grow up and get over it. 99% of the people who say they “aren’t heavy” actually are, your dad was probably just being a concerned parent. “unhealthy relationship with food”, LMAO. A first-world problem for sureFinally, the war in Gaza is brought up for some reason:
No, he was just a bully and abusive. But thanks for playing.
That’s a really weird thing to say to a stranger, dude
You ok bro? Did that make you feel good about yourself? To insult a stranger because you personally didn’t have to deal with abuse? Or let me guess, you did, but it made you a “strong man” who knows what’s best for everyone.
You don’t know me. You have no idea what my childhood and young adulthood was like and maybe it sounds like a “first world problem” (which by the way, is so fucking dismissive and gross to say to people when they an issue) to you, but for me it became an eating disorder that I still struggle with in my 40s.
I’m going to try to say this as politely as I can, please fuck off into the sun with your bullshit and go troll somewhere else. You’re an asshole who seems to get off on insulting people to get your pathetic dick hard. I hope you don’t have kids because I worry if you do how fucked up they are and if you’re married I feel terrible for your wife. But let’s be honest, you’re a sad, lonely, angry man who has nothing better to do.
Dumbass takes like this are part of the reason people develop eating disorders on both ends of the spectrum.
You're gonna tell me someone who is suffering from Anorexia/Bulimia just needs to "grow up and get over it"?
You need to grow up and take a biology class.
When did the commenter say she had anorexia/bulimia? Those are actual eating disorders…she just said she eats very little and blames her dad.
A biology class, really? Psychology sounds more like it. Or are you telling me you learned about eating disorders in a bio class? Where was that, at some sort of school that gives out certificates in self-actualization or holistic-healing?
Sorry -- from what school did you get a psychology degree that allows you to label Anoerixa/Bulimia as "actual" eating disorders but not what OP described?
The school of hard knocks 😂 he’s so superior to us that he can diagnose a stranger through the internet on Reddit based on a paragraph that seemed to make him bigly angry.
He’s just a sad man who needs to get off by insulting people. He can go live that life and we’ll be over on this said being human to each other.
You know that on the other side of the apartheid wall Israel set up there are thousands of people who had access to the Dead Sea (and their homes), that was changed by the establishment of Israel. Millions of people around the world are coming to the decision to boycott any company that supports the Israeli Apartheid Occupation. Millions are urging their universities and employers to divest any money and programs with the genocidal force that is Israel. I urge you and your family to take a hard look at yourselves and learn what Israel really is made of. Then the logical decision will be to never visit or spend a dime in Israel until their genocide and apartheid ends. Ty
Take a walk off a short pier.
This response is unhinged.
“Learn about an ongoing genocide, with bombs falling through the air as we speak, that you knowingly or unknowingly support, that we can do something about”
“Your response”
Please just look someone in the eyes today and remember what it means to be a human. Each of us is a library of life, and we’re constantly diminishing the value of each other as “enemies”.
I’d rather that than share air with someone who supports the ongoing genocide. Not for me, not for you, but for the kids and our collective humanity: please learn something new today.
You’re supporting the death of my family in Israel. Seriously, you’re a PoS
Before Israel was, there was Palestine. Palestine was for all. Muslims, Christians, and Jewish families all lived together. We all visited Jerusalem.
When Israel decided that only Jewish people would now be allowed in to these random borders drawn over Palestine, well, that should come off as racist. Now the Christian and Muslim Palestinians had their villages raided and their women raped by a well funded militia, before it became the IDF. This terrorised the Palestinians that lived in their homes, so they ran.
Then these homes were empty.
The land without people for the People without a land. Fabulous. Absolutely fabulous. The people that were born there were displaced by a terrorist militia, and now it was a land magically without a people.
And your family came in, and settled in “Israel”. A family out there has the keys to the very home your family lives in in Israel, although you’ve probably changed the locks by now.
But for generations this land fed them and protected them from the elements. All of a sudden it’s yours?
And the people Israel oppresses, the thousands of Palestinians that are in prison with no trial. Children and women Palestinians have been taken captive for over 70 years!! Where’s the outrage?
Are we not human?
When we say free Palestine from the river to the sea. It’s for everybody. Come by and buy my home. But please don’t show up with an armed force ready to exterminate me for refusing you the home my forefathers have called their own.
TLDR Israel is the fire nation in avatar the last airbender.
The best way I can put it is.. if a bunch of armed chickens showed up and kicked you and your family out of their homes, one day you might want to fight those armed chickens back instead of being homeless. Israel are the armed chickens
The Flairs:
2024.05.19 00:59 GoAheadMMDay UPDATE 3: Torment Techniques Used by Canadian and US Militaries
 | Update #3 appears at the bottom. submitted by GoAheadMMDay to Liberty [link] [comments] Due to numerous disparaging comments by multiple individuals, I have reposted my article. Heckling does not change what occurred. People need to know these truths, especially those who have experienced the same. They need to know they are sane, that such things are indeed being perpetrated, and the perpetrators use shame to silence them and protect their activities. I write to encourage them not to listen to disparaging people who speak without knowledge. February 10, 2024 I am Joseph Cafariello, a Canadian citizen and ex-member of the Canadian military. Of sound mind, not on medication, not a drug user, not a marijuana smoker, not an alcohol drinker, with no mental disorders. I recently posted to this Liberty subreddit experiences of harassment by Vancouver's police and fire departments (Vancouver, BC, Canada). I’m the fellow who was repeatedly ordered by police to stay out of Vancouver’s Stanley Park, and was continually harassed whenever I visited the park (which I do every second day on my early morning walks). Immediately following that post, they changed some of the techniques they use in my case. They were either informed of my post or found it themselves, seeing as my internet activity, and phone activity for that matter, are under continuous surveillance (plenty of proof which I will not include here to avoid running off-topic). In this post, I would like to shed some light on other harassment which is still ongoing, since it occurs in private, away from potential observers. It involves the Canadian and US militaries. Havana Syndrome In 2016, numerous employees of the Canadian and US embassies in Havana, Cuba, started experiencing head injuries ranging from mild headaches to concussions. It happened in their sleep, and came to be called Havana Syndrome. Wikipedia explains (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Havana\_syndrome): “Havana syndrome is a cluster of idiopathic symptoms experienced mostly abroad by U.S. government officials and military personnel. The symptoms range in severity from pain and ringing in the ears to cognitive dysfunction and were first reported in 2016 by U.S. and Canadian embassy staff in Havana, Cuba. Beginning in 2017, more people, including U.S. intelligence and military personnel and their families, reported having these symptoms in other places, such as China, India, Europe, and Washington, D.C. The U.S. Department of State, Department of Defense, and other federal entities have called the events "Anomalous Health Incidents" (AHI). Of over a thousand purported cases, the majority of US investigative bodies found only a few dozen cases to be suspicious.” Ladies and gentlemen, I can tell you exactly what happens, because I have been experiencing this since I first joined the Canadian military back in 2002, and am still experiencing these “torments” (as I call them) to this day, already 3 years after leaving the military. I go to bed. In about 15 minutes, just as I am on the cusp of falling asleep, a hear and feel a heavy thud reverberate and ultimately strike my skull. My body releases a sharp burst of adrenalin, my heart starts racing, and my blood’s circulation speeds up significantly. Depending on the severity of the blow, it can take me anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour to fall asleep again. Though there have been times I could not return to sleep for more than 2 hours. A strong headache is felt immediately, and lasts for hours. There have been times when my heart felt like it was going to burst, having been startled as such. The pulse to the head sometimes reverberates through the wall and my bed’s headboard. I distinctly feel as though I have been hit on the top of my skull. At other times, it feels as though the pulse has come through the air, striking the side of my skull. This is not a sleep disorder, for it does not occur regularly. At times, my sleep is disturbed in this manner 3 or 4 days in a row. At other times, there is no disturbance for up to a week. But they never let me go more than a week without such interruptions to my sleep. Neither is it sleep apnea, as I do not awaken gasping for breath. The pounding headaches, sudden release of adrenaline, and heart palpitations I experience are caused by external impacts of sound waves or air bursts. Sonic Weapons How these pulses are produced is not easy to identify. As Wikipedia explains: “Once the story became public, various U.S. government representatives attributed the incidents to attacks by unidentified foreign actors, and various U.S. officials blamed the reported symptoms on a variety of unidentified and unknown technologies, including ultrasound and microwave weapons.” Sonic weapons have been in use for many years by militaries, and by police in crowd control. As Wikipedia explains (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic\_weapon): “Some sonic weapons make a focused beam of sound or of ultrasound; others produce an area field of sound. As of 2023 military and police forces make some limited use of sonic weapons.” (Do not believe the 2023 timeline. The Canadian military has been using these weapons since the early 2000’s at the latest.) Wikipedia continues: “Extremely high-power sound waves can disrupt or destroy the eardrums of a target and cause severe pain or disorientation. This is usually sufficient to incapacitate a person. Less powerful sound waves can cause humans to experience nausea or discomfort.” The users of these technologies must also be using thermal detection equipment to monitor the target’s sleep. As I mentioned, I most often feel these blows the moment I am falling asleep. Body temperature drops when we sleep, and brain activity slows. Heat-detection equipment is likely being used to identify the point at which the target is falling asleep. Why they prefer to strike at the start of someone’s sleep as opposed to the middle of their sleep, I do not know. Perhaps their intent is to deprive the body of early sleep, limiting the amount of deep sleep available to the person before their alarm rings in the morning. Ordinary Hammers Not all such “torments” (as I call them) are caused by high-tech equipment. I have heard and felt distinct hammer strikes running along the 2x4 beams inside my walls. These strikes can be a single hard strike, or several strikes in a row. It is definitely caused by a person with a hammer because the intervals between strikes are equidistant in time; that is, the time spacing between strikes is not random and does not change from strike to strike, but is constant between strikes, exactly as when someone is hammering. And no, it is not someone hanging pictures at 1:30 am, multiple times a week, for years. On one occasion, when I was standing at my kitchen sink, I felt the floor-board directly under my feet pulse so sharply it felt like a brick had struck the soles of my feet. In this case, my military neighbour likely used a hammer to strike the floorboard on his side of the wall. It is the only plausible explanation. Surveillance This leads to surveillance of one’s activities at home. I have plenty of proofs of that. They seem insignificant on an individual basis. But when you put them all together, they present a clear picture of home surveillance. My laptop computer’s lid cracked one night, at the bottom left corner of the screen. The next day at work, I heard my military supervisor relate to another co-worker that the night before, his laptop computer’s lid cracked at the bottom left corner. I swear to the Lord in Heaven, I am being truthful. I tested my suspicion of being surveilled. At home one night, I blurted out-loud, “VW Passat. What an ugly sounding word, ‘Passat’”, I said. A few days later, my military colleagues at work started playing a card game at lunch, invented by one of them. The name he gave his game was “Passat”, and when he spoke it, he looked at me for a reaction. If you ever contact the Halifax military base, ask for the Claims Department and ask them if they are still playing Passat. On another occasion, at a time when I frequented the gym every second day for a few years, I suspected my van had been fitted with a listening device. I suspected so because a number of things I had spoken with people about on my phone while in my van (nothing illegal) were repeated by people at the gym in conversations among themselves. Too many times, parts of other people's conversations matched parts of conversations I had had with others while I was in my van. I already knew my phone was being tapped, but I also suspected my van was bugged. So one evening while driving in my van, I blurted out-loud a number of things I said I hated. "I hate (this or that)"; "I hate it when...". One of them was, "I hate when people chew gum with their mouths open." I then vocalized an exaggerated gnawing sound, "Gnaw. Gnaw. Gnaw." The very next time I went to the gym, 2 days later, while I was at an exercise, a fellow sat at an exercise directly behind me. And sure enough, he started chewing with his mouth open, vocalizing that gnawing sound, "Gnaw. Gnaw. Gnaw." I didn't look behind at him, because I knew what was going on, and I wanted to avoid playing into his hand. So he repeated himself again and again until I was done and moved to a different station. Now, honestly, who chews gum at the gym? You can't. Or you run the risk of choking for the heavy breathing, not to mention when laying down on benches. And with precisely the same exaggerated vocalized gnawing sound I had made in my van just 2 days prior. Their whole intent is to let you know you are being surveilled. They want you to know, as both a warning and a provocation. They want you to say something, to launch accusations, which they would readily deny, making you look paranoid. If you react too strongly, they could even have you diagnosed with some kind of disorder, and put you on medication, which further plays into their hand. (More regarding medications in the last section of this post.) This is why, as I mentioned in my previous post, they would park their cars shining their high beams on me as I walked past them during my morning walk. And why on some occasions, a group of 3 or 4 would exit their cars and stand on my path just as I approached, forcing me to go around them. They would then remain standing on the path until my return trip through, and after I had passed by the second time, then would then return to their cars - making it absolutely clear I was their interest. Their intent is not only to make me aware, but also to present themselves in close proximity to me, within easy reach, in the hope I would confront them, resulting in an altercation that could land me in a lot of hot water - 4 witnesses against me, all pleading innocence. Again, it is all designed to make you look bad, and to warrant some kind of legal measure against you - preferably a medical diagnosis, discrediting you in everything you say about them. If they can't refute your claims, their only remaining option is to discredit you. That's what all of these tricks are designed to accomplish. Who would believe anything you say, once you have been diagnosed with a disorder? There are plenty more examples. But who would really believe them? I’ll save them for the future. Home Invasion Both during and after my military service, I have had my apartments entered without any signs of break-ins. How? Lock-picking and duplicate keys. Indications? Missing objects; ie: money, phone adaptor, etc. Nothing major. Just something to make us understand we are being watched, and to make us understand what they can do. But it is always something small, something for which you would be ridiculed for divulging. Two more examples: I found my razor, which I always lay-down razor-end to the wall, turned around, razor-end toward me. Also, in one of my house slippers I found a small shoe sticker on the up-side of the heel. I had those slipper for years, and never had any shoe stickers on them. Yet there it was, clearly visible on the top surface of my slipper, not the bottom. Could I have stepped on a shoe sticker when barefoot in my apartment, only to have the sticker transfer itself to my slipper when I wore it? How many shoe stickers do you have laying around your apartment that you can accidentally step onto? If I had stepped onto a sticker in my apartment and had it stick to my heel, that means the sticky side was up against my skin. This means the sticker would have had to flip upside down such that the sticky side would then be down, allowing the sticker to stick to the slipper. Do you really think that happened? That sticker was not there when I left my apartment, but it was there when I returned. And it was the wrong sticker, wrong brand, wrong size. Again, what is their intent? To make someone look ridiculous so no one will believe them should they speak of other more sensitive things. Staged Incidents The above incidents clearly point to coordinated and staged events (at my work, my home, on my walks, etc). This is so frequently met with incredulity. "But that would require coordination on the part of so many people," the public dismisses. "They wouldn't do that." Oh yes they would, and they have, as explained in https://fightgangstalking.com/. Note the documented cases involving the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS, Canada's equivalent to the US' CIA) and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP, Canada's national police force) in the second quote, which were reported in national newspapers. From https://fightgangstalking.com/: “Disruption operations often involve tactics which are illegal, but difficult to prove. These tactics include – but are not limited to – overt surveillance (stalking), slander, blacklisting, “mobbing” (intense, organized harassment in the workplace), “black bag jobs” [home invasions], abusive phone calls, computer hacking, framing, threats, blackmail, vandalism, “street theater” (staged physical and verbal interactions with minions of the people who orchestrate the stalking), harassment by noises, and other forms of bullying. Many of these tactics were used by the FBI during its illegal COINTELPRO operations, as documented by stolen official documents and subsequent Congressional investigations. "Although the general public is mostly unfamiliar with the practice, references to “disruption” operations – described as such – do occasionally appear in the news media, even though that fact would apparently be news to the editors of The New York Times. In May 2006, for example, an article in The Globe and Mail, a Canadian national newspaper, reported that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) used “Diffuse and Disrupt” tactics against suspects for whom they lacked sufficient evidence to prosecute. A criminal defense attorney stated that many of her clients complained of harassment by authorities, although they were never arrested." She can add me to that list too. For the Benefit of Others The experiences I have recounted here seem so trivial, so insignificant, they make you look ridiculous if you talk about them. But if we don’t talk about such things, no one will ever know about them. Other people have experienced the same, and are forced to endure such torments in silence. They need encouragement to talk about their own experiences, and so I write about mine in the hope they will talk about theirs, even if I do look ridiculous. The perpetrators are more ridiculous for doing them. I remember a military colleague being hauled away by military police one morning, as she was struggling and having a violent fit. A fellow on her floor told me she was throwing chairs at her walls screaming, “Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!”. When he mentioned that, I knew exactly what they had done to her. She was considered unruly, and was being watched intently. They wanted her out, and that is how they accomplished it. Through wall tapping and sleep deprivation, they push you to the breaking point. And when you finally lose control and do something rash, they pounce on you, and you’re out. Now she has a criminal record, considered a criminal when in reality she was a victim. Welcome to the Canadian military, and other militaries besides, I am sure. There are dozens upon dozens of experiences I could present. But who will really read them? Worse still, who will really believe them? I overheard my military supervisor in Halifax whisper to another, “Do you think he knows?”, after I had mentioned one of the many “coincidences” I experienced, but with a tone of my being aware it was not a mere coincidence. As I turned my face to my computer screen, I whispered under my breath, but still loud enough for him to hear, “Yes, (rank) (name), I know.” A few minutes later, as he walked past my desk, he leaned in by my ear and whispered, “We’re just trying to help you.” I should have pressed him for answers right then and there, but you just don’t know how much trouble you can get into when making such accusations in the military. So I let it go. But I will never forget. Should anyone reading this ever decide to launch some kind of inquiry, I can mention names of over 100 people to contact, including military personnel, family members, neighbours, building managers, and others who have been contacted by military personnel with false narratives about me. They flash their ID’s and other credentials, and people believe anything they say. They turn family, friends, co-workers and neighbours against you, even recruiting their participation. Your acquaintances not only participate, but actually feel justified and emboldened playing tricks on you. It isn't their fault, though; they have been misled. I would reference them solely for corroboration. As a final thought, here are explanations of two military programs in which certain persons (sometimes military, sometimes civilian) are kept under constant surveillance, and are in some cases subjected to conditioning in an attempt to turn them into what is called a “sleeper agent”. Almost all of the tactics presented below have been experience by me, including constant surveillance (ie: my previous post here regarding being harassed on my morning walks) and sleep deprivation (as per the top portion of this post, which other military members in Cuba and elsewhere around the world have also experienced). Pentagon’s Signature Reduction Program See Newsweek’s article: https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-inside-militarys-secret-undercover-army-1591881 Some excerpts from that Newsweek article, plus more background information on the Pentagon’s Signature Reduction Program, can be found here: https://fightgangstalking.com/ “The largest undercover force the world has ever known is the one created by the Pentagon over the past decade. Some 60,000 people now belong to this secret army, many working under masked identities and in low profile, all part of a broad program called “signature reduction.” The force, more than ten times the size of the clandestine elements of the CIA, carries out domestic and foreign assignments, both in military uniforms and under civilian cover, in real life and online, sometimes hiding in private businesses and consultancies, some of them household name companies. “…a little-known sector of the American military, but also a completely unregulated practice. No one knows the program’s total size, and the explosion of signature reduction has never been examined for its impact on military policies and culture. Congress has never held a hearing on the subject. And yet the military developing this gigantic clandestine force challenges U.S. laws, the Geneva Conventions, the code of military conduct and basic accountability. “…The signature reduction effort engages some 130 private companies to administer the new clandestine world. Dozens of little known and secret government organizations support the program, doling out classified contracts and overseeing publicly unacknowledged operations. "Federal spy agencies are using Americans to spy on their fellow citizens – the same approach to governance famously employed by communist East Germany." How to Develop a Hypnotic Sleeper Agent By Dantalion Jones / Masters of Mind Control The following “was” on the web, but has been removed. Surprise, surprise. But I saved its web files to my computer years ago, knowing that sooner or later it would be removed. I made a jpeg image of the web page as it once appeared, attached here. Note that I have experienced almost all of the tactics described below, including the stalking I mentioned in my previous post here (regular walks in the park), the sleep deprivation noted at the top of this post, and the surveillance and intrusions described here as well. Quoting the now-removed webpage: “How to Develop a Hypnotic Sleeper Agent” (from here to end of post): Amid all the conspiracy theories one of the most feared is that there exist "sleeper agents" in our society who are programmed to come into service when they are triggered by a phone call or key word. These alleged sleeper agents don't even know they are programmed to become saboteurs, soldiers, suicide bomber, etc because of the thoroughness of their programming. They are the feared "Manchurian Candidate" that the movies portray. The question is "Are they real?" If they are true sleeper agents there is no way of telling until they are activated. One can however theorize exactly how they are made. Indoctrination Using indoctrination a person can be made to embrace a religious or philosophical belief that would make becoming a sleeper agent possible. This would be a person so committed to an ideal they would be willing to wait patiently as a member of society until they are called into action. These people would know their mission and consciously hold it secret while interacting with the rest of society. Conditioning Conditioning is a repetitive process where the desired responses are enforced and rewarded and unwanted responses are punished. This can be done consciously as part of training drill and it can be done subconsciously using hypnosis or drugs to create amnesia. Hypnosis It has been demonstrated that hypnosis can create "amnesia walls" in which the subject has no conscious memory of what happened in the hypnosis session. It has further been demonstrated that hypnosis can give post hypnotic instruction to be carried out automatically in the waking state without the subject knowing it or questioning the behavior. What follows is conjecture and theory based on testimonials of people who were alleged to be sleeper agents and soldiers. Continuous Supervisions Continuous supervision doesn't mean that the subject is cut off completely from society. It means that they are constantly overseen and every aspect of their lives are managed (without their knowledge or consent) to support their hypnotic programming. This would include: • Repeated reinforcement of all hypnotic conditioning. • Handlers. Handlers are people who help maintain the subjects environment to maintain all the programming. They can play the role of family, friends, lovers, psychologists, coaches or any roll the subject perceives as supportive. The truth is the handlers are their to support the successful fulfillment of the programming and not the subject as a person. • Minimal sleep so that the mind/brain does not process all the sleeper conditioning during sleep. • Creating constant environmental challenges like unemployment or poverty. This gives the subject something other than their programming to focus on. • Frequent hospitalization. This gives overt opportunity to sedate the subject for conditioning. If the subject has a history of hospitalizations for mental disturbances all the better. No one will take them seriously. Joseph Cafariello PS... Today is the second day after this post (February 12, 2024). A garbage truck just slammed into my parked car. PPS... I finish writing this post because I am satisfied with its shape and content; not because of what happened to my car. It is similar to when you are reaching for your coat, and someone tells you, "Take your coat." Since you have to take your coat, your brain tells you it's ok to obey them, and you comply. They just created an instance where they led you, and you followed them. And your brain accepted it. It's a technique the military uses all the time. It trains you to accept instructions from that person or group. Done enough times, you become comfortable obeying them. I just say, "I take my coat because I choose to, not because you tell me to." It's important to make that clear, to block the conditioning and affirm our self-governance; not just to them, but to ourselves as well. Now our brain realizes we took our coat by our own choice; we are still in command. So too, I say regarding today's event. "Thanks for the warning, but I had already finished writing my post. I finished by my own choosing." UPDATES 1 & 2: February 26 & March 07, 2024: My apartment was once again entered while I was out. Either a key was used or the lock was picked. This may or may not have included assistance from building staff. Home invasions are included in the list of their techniques noted above, referred to as "black bag jobs". All tenants on my floor received new fridges a couple of weeks ago. I removed the tape securing the bins inside my new fridge, and also removed all styrofoam pads from the corners of the glass shelves when I repositioned them. The person(s) who have been invading my living space on a regular basis have struck again. As you can see in the photo below, the styrofoam pads on the corners of my fridge's shelves were restored when I was out of my apartment. I had removed all pads when I repositioned the shelves. Yet now they are back. It is a tactic used to undermine our observational awareness in an attempt to make us second-guess and doubt ourselves. The aim is to cause people to feel less sure not only of the things we have done, but also feel less sure of the things others have done. They want us to question the accuracy of our observations and memory. The idea is to train you to dismiss any anomalies you may observe as being your own misperception of things. Once they convince you not to trust your own judgement, they are free to do whatever they want to you, and you will simply accept it without questioning. UPDATE 3: May 18, 2024: Confrontations with individuals keep occurring, at times potentially violent. Following are just 3 such encounters as of late. 1 - Kick-boxer in the park: As I parked my car in one of the parking lots in Vancouver's Stanley Park one night, another vehicle drove up behind me and parked several spots away. A tall man exited that vehicle, and walked hastily along the path I always walk, down some steps to the water's sea wall path. I took my time and followed my usual walk, also down the steps down to the sea wall. The man knew my routine, and was in a hurry to get ahead of me. As I walked along the sea wall, I saw the same man sitting on a bench, playing a loud religious sermon in a foreign language on a device I did not clearly see. As I walked past him, he called out to me to stop and chat. I ignored him and continued walking past. He rose and started walking behind me. I opened my umbrella, turned, and walked past him the other way, returning to the stairs back to the parking lot. He also turned and continued following me. I started running. He also started running. I ran up the steps, as did he. Being taller than I am, his legs are longer than mine, and he quickly caught up to me on a grassy patch at the top of the steps. I turned to him and asked, "Why are you following me?" He did not reply, but stood profile to me, the same stance a kick-boxer uses when ready to kick someone. He was tall, thin, and in excellent physical shape as you would see in a kick-boxer. He did not speak at all, but was just waiting for me to make a move. I turned, entered my vehicle and left. The encounter continued with a chase through the park in our cars. Yes, that is correct. He chased me out of the park in his car. 2 - Told to keep quiet: The perpetrators need to operate with as little detection as possible, and they repeatedly warn their subjects to keep their mouths shut about their experiences. On another of my recent nightly walks, a man stood on the sidewalk ahead of me about half a block away, looked at me, and shouted into the sky at nobody, giving the appearance of being a homeless person shouting for no reason. He then started walking in my direction. I continued walking straight. As he passed me, he leaned into my face and shouted into my ear, "Shut the f_ck up!" I continued walking in my direction, and he resumed walking in his. The idea is to make it seem as though he is just a deranged man wandering the streets at night, shouting at nothing, so that when he shouts at me, any observer would simply dismiss his actions. But in reality, he was sent to send me a message to stop publishing posts like this, which I had done many times on many sites, and continue to. They don't like it when we reveal their methods. But the truth must be known. 3 - You'll be sorry: On another occasion, while returning from grocery shopping one afternoon, I walked past a man sitting by a storefront. He was clean-cut, wearing clean clothes, without any carts or wagons or any belongings of any kind. As I passed him, he asked me for some spare change. I replied, "I'm sorry," and continued walking past. He replied, "You will be." There are numerous other experiences, like two seemingly unassociated men standing on the sea wall about 100 meters away from each other, each of them spitting just as I walked past each one. There are too many experiences to mention. Looking at each experience individually, one would easily dismiss them as being unrelated and simply coincidental. But put them all together and a picture starts to form, like putting together the pieces of a puzzle. As I hand you each piece of the puzzle one by one, you dismiss each piece, saying, "This could be anything." And you discard it. You keep discarding each piece as I hand it to you. By the end of it, you look down at the table and say, "You have nothing." That's because you looked at each piece as a separate item and threw it away. But if you leave the pieces on the table as I hand them to you and do not hastily discard them, you will see they form a clear picture when put all together. We must look at all these events as a whole. Individually, each one could be anything. But when all of these experiences are put together and considered as a whole, they form an undeniable picture. Do not be quick to dismiss each piece. Leave the pieces on the table and look at the whole. The picture I present is sound. Remember, I have all the pieces; you do not. I see the picture more clearly than you do. https://preview.redd.it/we31ymcsm91d1.jpg?width=966&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3d56ac3dd3558a60d477ba9315104d1b66b139f8 |
2024.05.19 00:58 neptunes097 Why is this so hard?
Last month in April, one weekend I had a migraine for 48 hours straight. It was kind of scary because I’ve never had a migraine— i get headaches all the time but not migraines. Then, the very next day, I had the worst abdominal pain i’ve ever had in my entire life. Lying in the fetal position is the only thing that gave me some type of relief. No pain medication gave me any relief.
A couple days later, when the pain came to a functional level, I went to an ER. I thought i was getting better but i wanted to be safe. I NEVER went through anything like that in my life. So i go to the ER and I explain my symptoms to the physician and she asks “So why did you feel the need to come to the ER if you felt your symptoms were getting better?” I’m sorry, were you not listening? I had a 48 migraine then had the worst abdominal pain i’ve ever felt in my life. Is that not a reason to seek help??? Anyway, that hospital was trash. They gave me headache medication and did nothing for my pain.
The very next week I had to go back to another ER because my pain was not getting better. That ER they said I had a UTI and gave me antibiotics. Took them as instructions had said and i had 1.5 days left with developing new symptoms and with the antibiotics did not help.
So i go to a CVS Minute Clinic where i was told it might be a kidney infection, and i was given DIFFERENT antibiotics that worked.
Got my period and had the worst cramps I could have imagined. The pain was constant with no relief, even with OTC medication, a heating pad, or yoga. I got prescribed naproxen and that didn’t help either.
It is currently May 18th, and still in pain, and still no answer. I have had pelvic pain for over a month now and i have no clue as to what it is or how to treat it. I’m losing my mind. I don’t want to live my life in chronic pain already, i’m just 26, i don’t want to do this. Why is it so hard to just get help, to get answers, to talk to someone that actually wants to help me??
This is a rant but you can comment/ reply, i don’t mind.
submitted by neptunes097 to WomensHealth [link] [comments]
A couple days later, when the pain came to a functional level, I went to an ER. I thought i was getting better but i wanted to be safe. I NEVER went through anything like that in my life. So i go to the ER and I explain my symptoms to the physician and she asks “So why did you feel the need to come to the ER if you felt your symptoms were getting better?” I’m sorry, were you not listening? I had a 48 migraine then had the worst abdominal pain i’ve ever felt in my life. Is that not a reason to seek help??? Anyway, that hospital was trash. They gave me headache medication and did nothing for my pain.
The very next week I had to go back to another ER because my pain was not getting better. That ER they said I had a UTI and gave me antibiotics. Took them as instructions had said and i had 1.5 days left with developing new symptoms and with the antibiotics did not help.
So i go to a CVS Minute Clinic where i was told it might be a kidney infection, and i was given DIFFERENT antibiotics that worked.
Got my period and had the worst cramps I could have imagined. The pain was constant with no relief, even with OTC medication, a heating pad, or yoga. I got prescribed naproxen and that didn’t help either.
It is currently May 18th, and still in pain, and still no answer. I have had pelvic pain for over a month now and i have no clue as to what it is or how to treat it. I’m losing my mind. I don’t want to live my life in chronic pain already, i’m just 26, i don’t want to do this. Why is it so hard to just get help, to get answers, to talk to someone that actually wants to help me??
This is a rant but you can comment/ reply, i don’t mind.
2024.05.19 00:34 throwawaywalmartcrap I started a GLP-1 clinic to finally offer affordable sema and tirz
I don’t want to break any rules here but the sidebar says doctor-prescribed sourcing is okay. I am a physician who has personally experienced the life changing benefits of GLP-1 agonists and recently opened a virtual clinic providing affordable access to sema and tirz including dietician counseling and physical activity coaching. We have the cheapest pricing out of any competitors that I can find due to our careful selection of three specific compounding pharmacies which now cover all 50 states! Anyway, just wanted to put myself out there in case anyone has any questions a physician might need to answer and let you all know about the most affordable option for your monthly rx through us!
The clinic is New You Weight Loss & Wellbeing and we a offer free initial consult before your appointment with me or one of our other 3 physicians. Hope this helps any of you who are struggling to afford brand name GLP’s or can’t find them elsewhere! - Dr. Amy Johnson MD, Medical Director
submitted by throwawaywalmartcrap to TirzepatideRX [link] [comments]
The clinic is New You Weight Loss & Wellbeing and we a offer free initial consult before your appointment with me or one of our other 3 physicians. Hope this helps any of you who are struggling to afford brand name GLP’s or can’t find them elsewhere! - Dr. Amy Johnson MD, Medical Director
2024.05.19 00:28 shark_the_pythoneer 🚀 Join Our Python Dev Community: Collaborate, Learn, and Innovate Together! 🐍
 | https://preview.redd.it/uz8fk37zk91d1.jpg?width=1202&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=cd1b942d37a0d9ed7b91a35a2459f84f652c8c83 submitted by shark_the_pythoneer to PythonProgramming_ [link] [comments] Hey Python enthusiasts! 👋 Are you passionate about Python and looking to connect with like-minded developers? Whether you’re a seasoned pro or just starting, our vibrant community has something for everyone! ✨ What We Offer:
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2024.05.19 00:15 Medium-Wing-4710 The harrowing experience of a cancer-surviving partner turned abuser
Over the course of my 4 year marriage to my partner, I have arrived at the position that I was abused, manipulated, and functionally enslaved to a mentally ill partner.
In simplest form, the progression is apparently observable. She was diagnosed with cancer in October of 2019 while we were engaged. Due to the diagnosis, we moved up our actual marriage date (our wedding was still set for mid-April) to December 1, 2019. Her surgery was December 13, 2019. In my compassion for her, I agreed to move our wedding date up to offset her anxiety around who would be responsible for her if things went south with her surgical treatment.
Our first month of marriage was straightforward; she was on pain meds recovering from surgery, so the main engagement that occurred was me walking her up and down the hospital hallway as she recovered and trying to meet her base physical needs of hygiene, food, and presence. We stayed in the hospital for 2-3 weeks (with recurring hospital visits for complications).
Quickly after we figured out our marital living situation in her small 3-bed apartment with 2 roommates, our relationship devolved. Specifically, she was irritable because of the pain she was in, causing her to lash out at me with regular frequency for small things. If I didn’t put clothes away in the right place, didn’t anticipate her needs (without her communicating them), or ate the wrong food in front of her she would shout at me and decry me for my thoughtlessness.
These small, critical engagements were wounding and created a distance between us – and there was no upside. She was never kind, never paid mind to needs I might have, and started down a path of cultivating a root of bitterness in her soul. She quickly revealed herself to be venomous, hateful, and vindictive when she felt like she was wronged — and any observation of concern about our marriage resulted me in being accused of being mean or insensitive, even if I spent hours or days calculating the best way to share my concern (and I have a master’s degree in communication where I focused in studying disagreement — I know how to carefully package concerns).
During this time, I worked hard to provide for us, foreseeing a significant time period where I would have to be primary financial provider and caregiver. I increased my income each year we were married by around 25%, finishing our marriage at >$80,000 in yearly income, compared to starting our marriage at a modest $42,000 salary (including dramatically improving our healthcare). Frankly, I increased my income to provide for us in spite of the lack of support at home.
But to be clear: I don’t think it would have been particularly difficult to provide financially if I had an ounce of support at home.
However, the relentless criticism and expectation of mind-reading continued through the years. I rationalized this abuse for the first year of our marriage because of all the excuses to be cruel, she had a good one – she had cancer. I hung onto a hope that it would stop. Contrary to my hope, as the years went on – and our expenses climbed – and I continued to work myself to the bone – she continued to relentlessly critique and even started being more emotionally demanding, expecting me to take responsibility for her inability to cope with her emotions – I was drowning. She was asking too much of me. There was no deliverance from her abuse.
I was exhausted. In the peak of the abuse I endured at her hand, I was working multiple jobs, sleeping 10+ hours a night and napping frequently during the day around meetings and work, then coping with alcohol to numb myself to the abusive dynamic and fall asleep with no support from her. The only time I could approach her sexually was when I was intoxicated, with inhibitions lowered. The only time I could have a conversation with her was with a counselor in the room. Without something to mitigate opportunity for her to be cruel to me, either a mediator or self-medication, I was scared.
I lived at home in a constant state of alert and cognitive fatigue. No matter how I tried to make sense of my home life, I couldn’t. When she looked at or touched me, I would recoil in fear, anticipating some sort of incisive critique or demand expressed. Then she would criticize me for not responding warmly to her, exacerbating the cycle.
I couldn’t meet her needs – I was utterly exhausted. When I would tell her of the exhaustion I experienced in marital counseling, her responses were typically something along the lines of not believing me, denying what I was saying was true, or calling my exhaustion an ‘excuse’. I could interact happily with my friends… why not her?
I did not deny her demands were legitimate; rather, I expressed my inability to meet them because of how fatigued I was. I said ‘I can’t’ so many times. I realize her demands were small; affection, saying ‘i love you’, complimenting her. But it’s disorienting to be consistently berated and belittled by a person and then asked to compliment them and tell them you love them.
The push and pull of abuse is exhausting to a person who is not mentally because it does not make sense.
Further, in counseling I realized that I have forgotten that I have needs. I have lost the tools to even evaluate what my needs might be because, implicitly and explicitly in my marriage, I was told my needs don’t matter.
My marriage made no sense; I was obviously drowning, exhausted with the demands our life imposed on me. I was doing everything I could to get straight. I was in individual therapy, marital counseling, pastoral counseling, trying different antidepressants (4 in total – all with no effect), changing eating habits, trying to reduce my drinking, getting medical tests to see if I had health issues causing my fatigue, and being vulnerable in my friendships in an attempt to invite others in to process and move forward and figure out my marriage. I desperately shared everything I could about my marriage, hoping someone else would crack the code where I couldn’t.
None of my efforts worked. I could not get out of the exhausted state I was in. It’s worth noting here that within weeks of separating I almost completely cut out alcohol, got into a regular sleep schedule, was waking up at 6-7am every day and reading multiple hours (which I couldn’t do in marriage due to cognitive fatigue/distraction), and experienced a resurgence of energy. I have felt the duress I was under lift and lift and lift and the weeks and months have went on.
In retrospect, I was experiencing cognitive fatigue because I was taking the demands my wife was placing on me seriously, but no matter what I did I could not make sense of them. How could she not see that I was doing everything I could to make ends meet – the ends which she was imposing on me? I did not have additional energy left. She would ask me ‘Do you love me?’ and I didn’t know how to respond. How is my work not at least some symbol of love? My dream was to be a poor professor, which she knew – instead I was grinding myself to the bone, working in digital marketing with multiple freelance projects, picking up a bartending gig and a teaching gig on top of full-time employment.
The last straw was when she accused me of abuse. I took that accusation seriously, and weighed it against my experience. ‘Am I an abuser?’ I asked myself. I sorted through my behavior and how I treated her. I came to the conclusion that I may be a poor husband in serious ways; but I am not an abuser. And the abuse question opened the door to the question… ‘I may not be an abuser… but is there abuse in our marriage?’ And the answer quickly became ‘Yes.’
When we were married, I understood that she wasn’t going to work much for a while. However, she worked the bare minimum she could for 4 years, earning at most in a single year $18,000. As the years went on and my income climbed, our debt continued to climb as well. She was still contributing the same, yet spending frivolously on useless knick knacks for our home and a cat. As I packed up our home to sell, the majority of items were dozens of boxes of useless junk she’d accumulated.
She lived a life of mania around finances. We would go to marital counseling and she would regularly express, ‘I would rather be poor and happy than rich and sad’. We were poor and sad. Sure, my income was the highest it’d ever been – but we were still drowning, with debts climbing. At the end of our marriage, we’d accumulated about $20,000 in consumer debt between credit cards and personal loans.
It was traumatizing (and abusive) to go to counseling and be told by my partner she would ‘rather be poor and happy and than rich and sad’ when the factual scenario we were living was neither. She actively denied reality – both my lived experience and the reality of our finances – at my expense. It was killing me, trying to make sense of what we were going through but being unable to make sense of what I was being told and what I was experiencing.
Throughout this time, it is worth adding that she also leveraged my spiritual leadership to ‘set me straight’. I was in a conservative Evangelical space, believing that men are the ultimate provider in a family unit and primarily responsible for the status of the marriage. Because I was not doing what she wanted me to (lavishing her with affection), I was muscled into multiple groups and meetings where pastoral care intervened to restore our marriage. In the moment, I submitted to my pastoral care because of my trust for them and my faith in God. Now, I believe this dynamic was abusive; my pastoral care did not care in any sense for my soul; they only cared about fixing my marriage. No questions around ‘why’ my marriage was so bad were asked; only what was going on and how it could be fixed. I relish the thought of my pastoral care being held accountable for the abuse they exercised upon me during this time on judgment day, albeit through a shaken faith in a God that would enable this dynamic.
With my spiritual community, I shared that I felt like she was my tormentor; that she it felt as if I were on the ground due to exhaustion, and she was standing on my throat, telling me to ‘get up’ and ‘tell me you love me’; that our metaphorical life was a boat, sinking, and I was desperately bailing out water. All the while, she stood at the other end of the boat, desperately bailing water in and looking at me like I was a maniac.
And yet, because there was no adultery, there was no category for divorce. We had sworn an oath before God and were required to fix this.
As I reflect upon my marriage (and the ongoing divorce proceedings), a few things are clear.
She is an abuser. I don’t think she intends to be, but impact matters. She is mentally ill and unable to reckon with basic reality.
She is a manipulator. She manipulated my spiritual community against me. I was viewed as someone to be corrected while begging for help from my trusted friends and pastoral care, whom I now regret being vulnerable with due to their abuse and denial of my reality because I didn’t fit neatly into their thin theological categories.
She is an enslaver. In divorce proceedings, she is doing everything she can to get every dollar from me, leveraging student loans I did not co-sign, my continually increasing income due to my hard work, and denying every claim of dissipated assets she can.
It is truly a mind-breaking experience to see your compassion leveraged against you for money. I had to sit under an attorney proclaiming to a judge that, since I consented to move up our marriage date before her cancer surgery, ‘I knew what I was getting into’. That she is entitled to large sums of money (that do not exist; we never had more than $3000 in our bank account during marriage) due to that decision.
Even apart from the abuse, I did not know what I was getting into. Including the abuse, I am full of remorse for having invited such an evil, hateful person into my life.
This experience has been the most challenging to my faith. As I endured abuse from her, I trusted God in a few ways. That the compassion I showed would maybe be rewarded – or, at least not punished. That my spiritual community wanted what was best for me. That God was not a punitive, hateful God (like my partner). I do not believe this trust was well placed, but am open to shortcomings in my views here.
I struggle to consent to a God that allowed my experience to occur. I’m open and processing in some kind of faith, but I really don’t know what it looks like to find a place to put this pain and betrayal that I’m experiencing.
I am a survivor of abuse, and the abuse I endured was mind-shattering. I sacrificed everything to support a partner diagnosed with serious bodily illness, which drove her to hate me and deny my lived experience because she could not reconcile it with the hatefulness she cultivated over our marriage, choosing bitterness over any positivity for four years, poisoning my well-being in the process.
What I envisioned to be the most compassionate moment of my life — marrying a person with cancer and promising to support and love them — has become nothing but a symbol of pain and remorse. I envisioned a life where my partner and I would fight against the terror of cancer; instead she hopped to the other side, choosing her ongoing health issues as the ally and myself as the enemy.
It took me 4 years to realize it. And as she drags me through court to leverage every dollar out of me I can, my only regret is that I didn’t leave my abuser to her own devices sooner; self-pity, hatefulness, and a sheer disregard toward taking responsibility for anything.
I am grateful but drowning. As we are negotiating settlement, the end is near, and my abuser will soon be unable to execute any influence in my life.
submitted by Medium-Wing-4710 to abusesurvivors [link] [comments]
In simplest form, the progression is apparently observable. She was diagnosed with cancer in October of 2019 while we were engaged. Due to the diagnosis, we moved up our actual marriage date (our wedding was still set for mid-April) to December 1, 2019. Her surgery was December 13, 2019. In my compassion for her, I agreed to move our wedding date up to offset her anxiety around who would be responsible for her if things went south with her surgical treatment.
Our first month of marriage was straightforward; she was on pain meds recovering from surgery, so the main engagement that occurred was me walking her up and down the hospital hallway as she recovered and trying to meet her base physical needs of hygiene, food, and presence. We stayed in the hospital for 2-3 weeks (with recurring hospital visits for complications).
Quickly after we figured out our marital living situation in her small 3-bed apartment with 2 roommates, our relationship devolved. Specifically, she was irritable because of the pain she was in, causing her to lash out at me with regular frequency for small things. If I didn’t put clothes away in the right place, didn’t anticipate her needs (without her communicating them), or ate the wrong food in front of her she would shout at me and decry me for my thoughtlessness.
These small, critical engagements were wounding and created a distance between us – and there was no upside. She was never kind, never paid mind to needs I might have, and started down a path of cultivating a root of bitterness in her soul. She quickly revealed herself to be venomous, hateful, and vindictive when she felt like she was wronged — and any observation of concern about our marriage resulted me in being accused of being mean or insensitive, even if I spent hours or days calculating the best way to share my concern (and I have a master’s degree in communication where I focused in studying disagreement — I know how to carefully package concerns).
During this time, I worked hard to provide for us, foreseeing a significant time period where I would have to be primary financial provider and caregiver. I increased my income each year we were married by around 25%, finishing our marriage at >$80,000 in yearly income, compared to starting our marriage at a modest $42,000 salary (including dramatically improving our healthcare). Frankly, I increased my income to provide for us in spite of the lack of support at home.
But to be clear: I don’t think it would have been particularly difficult to provide financially if I had an ounce of support at home.
However, the relentless criticism and expectation of mind-reading continued through the years. I rationalized this abuse for the first year of our marriage because of all the excuses to be cruel, she had a good one – she had cancer. I hung onto a hope that it would stop. Contrary to my hope, as the years went on – and our expenses climbed – and I continued to work myself to the bone – she continued to relentlessly critique and even started being more emotionally demanding, expecting me to take responsibility for her inability to cope with her emotions – I was drowning. She was asking too much of me. There was no deliverance from her abuse.
I was exhausted. In the peak of the abuse I endured at her hand, I was working multiple jobs, sleeping 10+ hours a night and napping frequently during the day around meetings and work, then coping with alcohol to numb myself to the abusive dynamic and fall asleep with no support from her. The only time I could approach her sexually was when I was intoxicated, with inhibitions lowered. The only time I could have a conversation with her was with a counselor in the room. Without something to mitigate opportunity for her to be cruel to me, either a mediator or self-medication, I was scared.
I lived at home in a constant state of alert and cognitive fatigue. No matter how I tried to make sense of my home life, I couldn’t. When she looked at or touched me, I would recoil in fear, anticipating some sort of incisive critique or demand expressed. Then she would criticize me for not responding warmly to her, exacerbating the cycle.
I couldn’t meet her needs – I was utterly exhausted. When I would tell her of the exhaustion I experienced in marital counseling, her responses were typically something along the lines of not believing me, denying what I was saying was true, or calling my exhaustion an ‘excuse’. I could interact happily with my friends… why not her?
I did not deny her demands were legitimate; rather, I expressed my inability to meet them because of how fatigued I was. I said ‘I can’t’ so many times. I realize her demands were small; affection, saying ‘i love you’, complimenting her. But it’s disorienting to be consistently berated and belittled by a person and then asked to compliment them and tell them you love them.
The push and pull of abuse is exhausting to a person who is not mentally because it does not make sense.
Further, in counseling I realized that I have forgotten that I have needs. I have lost the tools to even evaluate what my needs might be because, implicitly and explicitly in my marriage, I was told my needs don’t matter.
My marriage made no sense; I was obviously drowning, exhausted with the demands our life imposed on me. I was doing everything I could to get straight. I was in individual therapy, marital counseling, pastoral counseling, trying different antidepressants (4 in total – all with no effect), changing eating habits, trying to reduce my drinking, getting medical tests to see if I had health issues causing my fatigue, and being vulnerable in my friendships in an attempt to invite others in to process and move forward and figure out my marriage. I desperately shared everything I could about my marriage, hoping someone else would crack the code where I couldn’t.
None of my efforts worked. I could not get out of the exhausted state I was in. It’s worth noting here that within weeks of separating I almost completely cut out alcohol, got into a regular sleep schedule, was waking up at 6-7am every day and reading multiple hours (which I couldn’t do in marriage due to cognitive fatigue/distraction), and experienced a resurgence of energy. I have felt the duress I was under lift and lift and lift and the weeks and months have went on.
In retrospect, I was experiencing cognitive fatigue because I was taking the demands my wife was placing on me seriously, but no matter what I did I could not make sense of them. How could she not see that I was doing everything I could to make ends meet – the ends which she was imposing on me? I did not have additional energy left. She would ask me ‘Do you love me?’ and I didn’t know how to respond. How is my work not at least some symbol of love? My dream was to be a poor professor, which she knew – instead I was grinding myself to the bone, working in digital marketing with multiple freelance projects, picking up a bartending gig and a teaching gig on top of full-time employment.
The last straw was when she accused me of abuse. I took that accusation seriously, and weighed it against my experience. ‘Am I an abuser?’ I asked myself. I sorted through my behavior and how I treated her. I came to the conclusion that I may be a poor husband in serious ways; but I am not an abuser. And the abuse question opened the door to the question… ‘I may not be an abuser… but is there abuse in our marriage?’ And the answer quickly became ‘Yes.’
When we were married, I understood that she wasn’t going to work much for a while. However, she worked the bare minimum she could for 4 years, earning at most in a single year $18,000. As the years went on and my income climbed, our debt continued to climb as well. She was still contributing the same, yet spending frivolously on useless knick knacks for our home and a cat. As I packed up our home to sell, the majority of items were dozens of boxes of useless junk she’d accumulated.
She lived a life of mania around finances. We would go to marital counseling and she would regularly express, ‘I would rather be poor and happy than rich and sad’. We were poor and sad. Sure, my income was the highest it’d ever been – but we were still drowning, with debts climbing. At the end of our marriage, we’d accumulated about $20,000 in consumer debt between credit cards and personal loans.
It was traumatizing (and abusive) to go to counseling and be told by my partner she would ‘rather be poor and happy and than rich and sad’ when the factual scenario we were living was neither. She actively denied reality – both my lived experience and the reality of our finances – at my expense. It was killing me, trying to make sense of what we were going through but being unable to make sense of what I was being told and what I was experiencing.
Throughout this time, it is worth adding that she also leveraged my spiritual leadership to ‘set me straight’. I was in a conservative Evangelical space, believing that men are the ultimate provider in a family unit and primarily responsible for the status of the marriage. Because I was not doing what she wanted me to (lavishing her with affection), I was muscled into multiple groups and meetings where pastoral care intervened to restore our marriage. In the moment, I submitted to my pastoral care because of my trust for them and my faith in God. Now, I believe this dynamic was abusive; my pastoral care did not care in any sense for my soul; they only cared about fixing my marriage. No questions around ‘why’ my marriage was so bad were asked; only what was going on and how it could be fixed. I relish the thought of my pastoral care being held accountable for the abuse they exercised upon me during this time on judgment day, albeit through a shaken faith in a God that would enable this dynamic.
With my spiritual community, I shared that I felt like she was my tormentor; that she it felt as if I were on the ground due to exhaustion, and she was standing on my throat, telling me to ‘get up’ and ‘tell me you love me’; that our metaphorical life was a boat, sinking, and I was desperately bailing out water. All the while, she stood at the other end of the boat, desperately bailing water in and looking at me like I was a maniac.
And yet, because there was no adultery, there was no category for divorce. We had sworn an oath before God and were required to fix this.
As I reflect upon my marriage (and the ongoing divorce proceedings), a few things are clear.
She is an abuser. I don’t think she intends to be, but impact matters. She is mentally ill and unable to reckon with basic reality.
She is a manipulator. She manipulated my spiritual community against me. I was viewed as someone to be corrected while begging for help from my trusted friends and pastoral care, whom I now regret being vulnerable with due to their abuse and denial of my reality because I didn’t fit neatly into their thin theological categories.
She is an enslaver. In divorce proceedings, she is doing everything she can to get every dollar from me, leveraging student loans I did not co-sign, my continually increasing income due to my hard work, and denying every claim of dissipated assets she can.
It is truly a mind-breaking experience to see your compassion leveraged against you for money. I had to sit under an attorney proclaiming to a judge that, since I consented to move up our marriage date before her cancer surgery, ‘I knew what I was getting into’. That she is entitled to large sums of money (that do not exist; we never had more than $3000 in our bank account during marriage) due to that decision.
Even apart from the abuse, I did not know what I was getting into. Including the abuse, I am full of remorse for having invited such an evil, hateful person into my life.
This experience has been the most challenging to my faith. As I endured abuse from her, I trusted God in a few ways. That the compassion I showed would maybe be rewarded – or, at least not punished. That my spiritual community wanted what was best for me. That God was not a punitive, hateful God (like my partner). I do not believe this trust was well placed, but am open to shortcomings in my views here.
I struggle to consent to a God that allowed my experience to occur. I’m open and processing in some kind of faith, but I really don’t know what it looks like to find a place to put this pain and betrayal that I’m experiencing.
I am a survivor of abuse, and the abuse I endured was mind-shattering. I sacrificed everything to support a partner diagnosed with serious bodily illness, which drove her to hate me and deny my lived experience because she could not reconcile it with the hatefulness she cultivated over our marriage, choosing bitterness over any positivity for four years, poisoning my well-being in the process.
What I envisioned to be the most compassionate moment of my life — marrying a person with cancer and promising to support and love them — has become nothing but a symbol of pain and remorse. I envisioned a life where my partner and I would fight against the terror of cancer; instead she hopped to the other side, choosing her ongoing health issues as the ally and myself as the enemy.
It took me 4 years to realize it. And as she drags me through court to leverage every dollar out of me I can, my only regret is that I didn’t leave my abuser to her own devices sooner; self-pity, hatefulness, and a sheer disregard toward taking responsibility for anything.
I am grateful but drowning. As we are negotiating settlement, the end is near, and my abuser will soon be unable to execute any influence in my life.
2024.05.18 23:21 Tesa_Tesanovic1988 What is a Venture Builder and how to design one?
A venture builder differs from other capital funds in that it depends mainly on the quality and dynamism of its networks (INSEAD, 2018). It means that a venture builder must find out which the best resource combination for creating the most explosive outcomes for it to gain market greater share faster than its rivals.
A venture builder differs from other capital funds in that it depends mainly on the quality and dynamism of its networks (INSEAD, 2018). It means that a venture builder must find out which the best resource combination for creating the most explosive outcomes for it to gain market greater share faster than its rivals.Corporations tend to use VB to reduce the chances of negative black swan exposure while raising their positive black swan exposure (Thng, 2019). According to conventional knowledge, business enterprises’ systems, structures, and procedures focus more on delivery and performance than on change and innovation (de Alvarenga et al., 2019). Firms must pursue the former to succeed in today’s competition, but they are likely to jeopardize their future well-being if they overlook the latter. Many companies have tried versatile structures or techniques like open innovation to balance effectiveness and creativity. Among these approaches, establishing incubator groups to create relationships with emerging start-up enterprises is a significant contemporary method (Massiera, 2021). The logic behind it is straightforward: VBs tap into new business models and talent pools while also transforming their own corporate cultures in return for helping new ventures deal with the risk of newness and evolve into more stable organizations (Cryptix, 2022). The venture builder environment is significant because they attempt to improve new venture success rates.
Goals and purpose of Venture BuilderGoals and purpose of Venture Builder
A Venture Builder is similar to a fast-paced tech startup, where its product is the venture, the prototype is the business model, and deliverables means perfect and timely deployment.Venture investors have a clear edge over firms that are leveraged or rely on grants for financing; it’s a possible solution to the funding gap that has been a challenge for early-stage companies (Massiera, 2021). Any start-up owned by the Venture Builder will almost certainly have some equity taken. Still, the start-up has the potential to accelerate in its early stages with the installation of shared services, expertise, and salary (Tkalich et al., 2021). It becomes a win-win situation for both parties, which boosts their chances of success. Venture builders either hire professionals or rely on extensive expertise and commercial experience. They exchanged technical experience with competent developers who can produce swiftly with the correct frameworks and assistance, as well as high-quality code (Tkalich et al., 2021). Even with a collection of proprietary technology that can be used to cut development time even more.
Over the past decade, many corporate innovation laboratories have sprung up. Cross-functional cooperation involving intrapreneurs in these laboratories helps companies come up with fresh ideas and concepts. On the other hand, these concepts are usually executed as startup priorities and get greater attention from the venture builders. Consequently, rather than forging new ground, venture builders often focus on boosting this young business. Meanwhile, corporate initiatives are designed to achieve mid to long-term goals. This eliminates the need for complicated integration concerns. With abundant resources, the venture builders may settle on innovative decisions at startup without facing the constraints of the corporate hierarchy. This results in quicker returns on investment and a better competitive edge for the startups. The startups are, thus, charged with exploring radical ideas and business models that address new consumer requirements, allowing the venture builder to diversify its risks of disruption.
The Distinction Between Incubators and Accelerators
Although each business is similar, its methods and target markets differ. Accelerators are short-term programs that target a wide range of start-ups, from pre-seed through scale-ups. Incubators are a kind of start-up help firm that is broader (Cryptix, 2022). Venture builders concentrate on bringing together teams and forming a group of start-ups simultaneously as part of a lengthier program that connects them to their network. Unfortunately, the phrase “venture builder” has only recently gained popularity in the entrepreneurial sector. “Accelerator” is a more often used word, yet it is still understudied. The words venture builder, accelerator, and incubator tend to be used interchangeably to gather as much information as possible, with the distinctions noted previously taken into account.Because venture capital companies are not operating businesses, they are unique. They put their money into potential teams and company concepts that match their requirements. Venture Builders, however, are heavily engaged in day-to-day operations management (Cryptix, 2022). When a Venture Builder has shares in a firm, it came up with the concept and put in a lot of work to build it, not because it contributed funds. It is also apparent that many Venture Builders are setting up funds to help with funding (Gerhardt et al., 2021). Contrary to the case of incubators and accelerators, Venture Builders find company ideas from within their networks and allocate internal teams to initiate the building from the bottom up. The link between a Venture Builder and its ventures is long-term; it is heavily engaged with the businesses it creates until they depart.
Process of creating a Venture Builder
Venture studios create businesses by developing new concepts and allocating teams to those with commercial potential (Doyle, 2021). Any dangerous assumptions that must be true for your idea to have any potential are addressed after the business concept has been fully understood. The first step is to determine whether or not your target clients have issues that need to be addressed and, if so, whether or not your concept offers the appropriate answers. After these concepts have been verified and proven, they are backed up by resources to create a minimum viable product (INSEAD, 2018). Building a team is a crucial aspect of the process for smart individuals who want to achieve big things. While some venture builders fund the design process first, others have created a strong reputation that allows them to seek funds before the ideas are specified. If the feasibility is confirmed at this time, the studio works on growing the new venture before attempting to depart. This business model cycle is repeated several times, each time resulting in creating a new venture (Garcia-Luengo, 2017). It is anticipated that if an idea fails, resources will be shifted, or the business case will be abandoned outright.Conclusion
The Venture Builder approach is becoming more popular. It is arguable if venture capital is a superior model. While each has its benefits, venture building is more facilitating and advantageous for a potential early-stage start-up firm, particularly one that has yet to support itself with working capital. It is indisputable that venture building is modernizing and deconstructing a process that was once somewhat of an art than a science, and equipping organizations and people by stressing the systematic use of human capital to create unique opportunities from the bottom up, thus boosting the possibilities of developing and growing successful companies. It is no longer a single personality that drives the company; instead it is the use of established procedures based on successful case studies, paired with the appropriate team and deployment at the right time that has enabled tales to be told.References
Cryptix. (2022). The difference between Incubator, Accelerator and Venture Builder. Retrieved from https://cryptix.ag/blog/the-difference-between-incubator-accelerator-and-venture-builde
de Alvarenga, R., Junior, O. C., & Zeny, G. C. (2019). Venture Building & Startup Studios versus Acceleration Programs-Conceptual & Performance Differences. In . ISPIM Conference Proceedings (pp. 1-14). The International Society for Professional Innovation Management.
Doyle, M. (2021, March 15). The Venture Studio Business Model Explained. Retrieved from https://theworldwecreate.net/insights/the-venture-studio-business-model-explained
Garcia-Luengo, J. (2017, Aug 29). Venture Building, a new model for entrepreneurship and innovation. Retrieved from https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/venture-building-new-model-entrepreneurship-jorge-garc%C3%ADa-luengo/
Gerhardt, V., Santos, J. D., Rubin, E., Neuenfeldt, A., & Mairesse Siluk, J. C. (2021). Stakeholders´ Perception to Characterize the Start-ups Success. Journal of technology management & innovation, 16(1), 38-50.
INSEAD. (2018). The Emerging Role of Venture Builders in EarlyStage Venture Funding. Retrieved from chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.insead.edu/sites/default/files/assets/dept/centres/gpei/docs/insead-student-emerging-role-of-venture-builders-oct-2018.pdf
Massi, M., Shah, P., Eckel, J., & Loughridge, J. (2022, Jan 12). The Venture Builder Strategy for Principal Investors. Retrieved from https://www.bcg.com/publications/2022/the-venture-builders-strategy-for-principal-investors
Massiera, P. (2021). Teaching business models through student consulting projects. Journal of Business Models, 9(3), 25-38.
Thng, P. (2019, Oct). Successful venture building: What matters! An empirical Successful venture building: What matters! An empirical examination of effective incubation practices . Retrieved from Singapore Management University Singapore Management University : https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1253&context=etd_coll
Tkalich, A., Moe, N. B., & Ulfsnes, R. (2021). Making Internal Software Startups Work: How to Innovate Like a Venture Builder? International Conference on Software Business (pp. 152-167). Springer.
Authors
Paul Lalovich
Organizational Effectiveness and Strategy Execution PracticeTesha Teshanovich
Organizational Effectiveness and Strategy Execution Practice2024.05.18 22:52 TheRavioliRomancer Calling all aesthetic nurses!
I posted in the wrong sub previously and was advised to post here :) thanks for taking the time to read!
I am finishing my A.A. Degree is Business Administration this Fall and the next year I will be pursuing my RN to become an Aesthetic Nurse. Long term I am going to own a Med Spa of my own. From what I’ve gathered through the research I am going to take the NCLEX-RN and I’d like to get certified in CANS. What’s the best step to take since I need 1,000 practice hours within a core specialty? What would that mean for me and where to go once I get my RN? Also, once I get my RN should I then get my estheticians license or is that a waste of time? Thanks for your help!
This is absolutely my calling, I will take any classes I need/don’t need to get to where I need to go! I’m not fearful of any vomit, blood, or the pressure of it all. I’ve been working as security in hospitals since the age of 18 (now 22) and have the ability to shadow lots of Medical staff, I respond to trauma codes for my reports. I’ve got a full ride scholarship until I’m 28 and I’ve already saved necessary funds for any certifications I might need.
submitted by TheRavioliRomancer to nursing [link] [comments]
I am finishing my A.A. Degree is Business Administration this Fall and the next year I will be pursuing my RN to become an Aesthetic Nurse. Long term I am going to own a Med Spa of my own. From what I’ve gathered through the research I am going to take the NCLEX-RN and I’d like to get certified in CANS. What’s the best step to take since I need 1,000 practice hours within a core specialty? What would that mean for me and where to go once I get my RN? Also, once I get my RN should I then get my estheticians license or is that a waste of time? Thanks for your help!
This is absolutely my calling, I will take any classes I need/don’t need to get to where I need to go! I’m not fearful of any vomit, blood, or the pressure of it all. I’ve been working as security in hospitals since the age of 18 (now 22) and have the ability to shadow lots of Medical staff, I respond to trauma codes for my reports. I’ve got a full ride scholarship until I’m 28 and I’ve already saved necessary funds for any certifications I might need.
2024.05.18 22:35 Academic_North1040 Where to generate data to a database (university project)
At Databases subject we are creating a database for a health care company.
I already created all the entities but now i need to populate the database (these are translated from Portuguese):
● 5 clinics, from at least 3 different locations in the Lisbon district
● 5-6 nurses per clinic
● 20 doctors specializing in ‘general practice’ and 40 others distributed as you see fit across up to 5 other medical specialties (including at least ‘orthopedics’ and ‘cardiology’). Each doctor must work in at least two clinics, and in each clinic every day of the week (including weekends), there must be at least 8 doctors
● Around 5,000 patients
● A minimum number of consultations in 2023 and 2024 such that each patient has at least one consultation, and on each day there are at least 20 consultations per clinic, and at least 2 consultations per doctor
● ~80% of consultations have an associated medical prescription, and prescriptions contain 1 to 6 medications in quantities between 1 and 3
● All queries have 1 to 5 symptom observations (with parameter but no value) and 0 to 3 metric observations (with parameter and value). There should be ~50 different parameters for the symptoms (no value) and ~20 different parameters for the metric observations (with value) and the two sets must be disjoint.
● All addresses are national and follow the Portuguese format, ending with postal code: XXXX-XXX and then the location.
The professor recommended using chatGPT for this but it isn't very helpfull.
Is there any website that i could use to help me? I can give more details if needed.
Thank you in advance!
submitted by Academic_North1040 to databasedevelopment [link] [comments]
I already created all the entities but now i need to populate the database (these are translated from Portuguese):
● 5 clinics, from at least 3 different locations in the Lisbon district
● 5-6 nurses per clinic
● 20 doctors specializing in ‘general practice’ and 40 others distributed as you see fit across up to 5 other medical specialties (including at least ‘orthopedics’ and ‘cardiology’). Each doctor must work in at least two clinics, and in each clinic every day of the week (including weekends), there must be at least 8 doctors
● Around 5,000 patients
● A minimum number of consultations in 2023 and 2024 such that each patient has at least one consultation, and on each day there are at least 20 consultations per clinic, and at least 2 consultations per doctor
● ~80% of consultations have an associated medical prescription, and prescriptions contain 1 to 6 medications in quantities between 1 and 3
● All queries have 1 to 5 symptom observations (with parameter but no value) and 0 to 3 metric observations (with parameter and value). There should be ~50 different parameters for the symptoms (no value) and ~20 different parameters for the metric observations (with value) and the two sets must be disjoint.
● All addresses are national and follow the Portuguese format, ending with postal code: XXXX-XXX and then the location.
The professor recommended using chatGPT for this but it isn't very helpfull.
Is there any website that i could use to help me? I can give more details if needed.
Thank you in advance!
2024.05.18 22:17 ScottCoffin We're all depressed, but that's okay [Rant]
Hey all, fellow lgbt teen here, and I'm going to talk about depression. Now I'm not going to going to give advice like "oh go outside" or "find god" because I don't know jack shit about your situation and depression. But it still remains the fact that a lot of us are depressed and down, so what now?
The easy answer is keep living, becuase that's all you really can do. You can medicate it with zoloft and Prozac, you can do any number of unhealthy ways to self medicate, you can talk to a therapist, you can trauma dump on random online, you can fill the hole with the want for a diagnosis for an illness, you can do a billion things to help. But at the end of the day only one way is proven to fix depression. Time.
Hold on! Hold on! I just said that I wasn't going to spew bullshit advice! And I'm not, hear me out pretty please. Time does fix things, no matter how bad it gets, it will always get better in the end. That doesn't mean that it won't get worse before it does, but it will get better someway somehow. That doesn't seem like the answer though, because it always seems to get worse. The thing you hate that happens will happen after you read this, you will still feel empty, you will still feel alone. But no matter how much worse it gets, it will get better, and if I'm wrong then you can make fun of me. But you'll be eating your words when it does get better. Tw: s_icidal ideas, light mentions of abu$e I once was talking to another lgbt teen on an online chat room, we will call them Astral, anyways Astral had it hard, abu$ive parents, trans, foster kid, the whole works. Practically a mental illness starting kit. Astral told me that they were thinking of leaving life, for good. I told them they shouldn't do that, gave them helpline, the works. But Astral was still feeling like they didn't belong here. So I told Astral a story with some blatant metaphors and a couple hidden ones, that story is this:
You ever drive past a forest that had a forestfire? Hot flames, a thousand degree nightmare ripping through trees that have been around for hundreds of years in seconds. I'm more scared of forestfires than I am of sharks, axe murderers, and bears combined. The strong wild fires cannot be stopped by firefighters, only contained and left to burn out. Forestfires are awful to say the least. If you have driven past a place ravaged by a forest fire? It looks like a big bump with skinny little burnt trees sticking up out of the ground, they are ugly and strange looking. But most people don't know a secret about those trees, they are still alive. The trees have hard bark, that hard bark is burt and scarred, broken and dead. Though the outside of the trees are burnt, the core is still alive. The tree still stands, scarred, charred, tired, and hurt, the tree still stands. When the forest all burns down, the strong stand still and wait. After a while the trees grow leaves again, they grow new limbs and continue on with life, they survive. They drop seeds that litter the ground. Big surprise, the rain comes, the newly fertilized ground has little saplings come out, under the towering big burnt trees. And the cherry on top? Scientists have discovered that those very same trees are more resistant to future flames from fires becuase of the things they went through. End of story
While I maybe not be a therapist, nor a psychiatrist, life coach, mediocre Ted talker, or wise drunk uncle. I do know one thing, whoever is reading this is a tree, and though you may be scarred, burnt, charred, that doesn't mean you are a goner. All it means is that you will be even more beautiful when the rain comes, weather you believe my dumb ass or not. You are alive.
Now Astral didn't leave the earth that day, they are alive as far as I know. But it wasn't from my story, as stated before: this story won't change shit. Astral stayed on this earth because they are one of the trees that when the forest burns down, the tough know what's coming so they survive becuase of their scars, not die at fault of them. Be gracious to yourself.
submitted by ScottCoffin to LGBTeens [link] [comments]
The easy answer is keep living, becuase that's all you really can do. You can medicate it with zoloft and Prozac, you can do any number of unhealthy ways to self medicate, you can talk to a therapist, you can trauma dump on random online, you can fill the hole with the want for a diagnosis for an illness, you can do a billion things to help. But at the end of the day only one way is proven to fix depression. Time.
Hold on! Hold on! I just said that I wasn't going to spew bullshit advice! And I'm not, hear me out pretty please. Time does fix things, no matter how bad it gets, it will always get better in the end. That doesn't mean that it won't get worse before it does, but it will get better someway somehow. That doesn't seem like the answer though, because it always seems to get worse. The thing you hate that happens will happen after you read this, you will still feel empty, you will still feel alone. But no matter how much worse it gets, it will get better, and if I'm wrong then you can make fun of me. But you'll be eating your words when it does get better. Tw: s_icidal ideas, light mentions of abu$e I once was talking to another lgbt teen on an online chat room, we will call them Astral, anyways Astral had it hard, abu$ive parents, trans, foster kid, the whole works. Practically a mental illness starting kit. Astral told me that they were thinking of leaving life, for good. I told them they shouldn't do that, gave them helpline, the works. But Astral was still feeling like they didn't belong here. So I told Astral a story with some blatant metaphors and a couple hidden ones, that story is this:
You ever drive past a forest that had a forestfire? Hot flames, a thousand degree nightmare ripping through trees that have been around for hundreds of years in seconds. I'm more scared of forestfires than I am of sharks, axe murderers, and bears combined. The strong wild fires cannot be stopped by firefighters, only contained and left to burn out. Forestfires are awful to say the least. If you have driven past a place ravaged by a forest fire? It looks like a big bump with skinny little burnt trees sticking up out of the ground, they are ugly and strange looking. But most people don't know a secret about those trees, they are still alive. The trees have hard bark, that hard bark is burt and scarred, broken and dead. Though the outside of the trees are burnt, the core is still alive. The tree still stands, scarred, charred, tired, and hurt, the tree still stands. When the forest all burns down, the strong stand still and wait. After a while the trees grow leaves again, they grow new limbs and continue on with life, they survive. They drop seeds that litter the ground. Big surprise, the rain comes, the newly fertilized ground has little saplings come out, under the towering big burnt trees. And the cherry on top? Scientists have discovered that those very same trees are more resistant to future flames from fires becuase of the things they went through. End of story
While I maybe not be a therapist, nor a psychiatrist, life coach, mediocre Ted talker, or wise drunk uncle. I do know one thing, whoever is reading this is a tree, and though you may be scarred, burnt, charred, that doesn't mean you are a goner. All it means is that you will be even more beautiful when the rain comes, weather you believe my dumb ass or not. You are alive.
Now Astral didn't leave the earth that day, they are alive as far as I know. But it wasn't from my story, as stated before: this story won't change shit. Astral stayed on this earth because they are one of the trees that when the forest burns down, the tough know what's coming so they survive becuase of their scars, not die at fault of them. Be gracious to yourself.
2024.05.18 22:16 SchrodingersMinou OCD/Health Anxiety resources
This is the text of the helpbot response which can be summoned by the automod on any post by commenting with the word “helpbot.” I’m posting it here to make it easier for new people to find.
Many people use this sub to seek reassurance for their fears. This is not helpful for managing a rabies phobia or obsession. OCD has a helpful page about reassurance-seeking.
Therapy and treatment are crucial to recover from OCD/health anxiety. Please don’t Google anything about bats or rabies but focus on accessing resources and recovering from your fears. You can check out OCD and HealthAnxiety for support and information. You can find a resource list here, which is geared towards relationship OCD but also includes a lot of information about OCD in general, including FAQs, workbooks, book recommendations, Youtube videos, apps, podcasts, and videos of kittens.
Here is a list of free crisis helplines around the world. Here is another crisis helpline directory that includes additional countries. In areas where 211 is available, dialing this number can connect you with mental health crisis services in your area or help you find where to seek immediate help in your area. If you're in the US, you can text "MHA" to 741-741 to have a text chat with a trained crisis counselor at the Crisis Text Line, or call 1-800-749-2673 for the NAMI Crisis Helpline.
You can ask your therapist if they have any workbooks or guides they can send you home with so that you can continue practicing and working on your therapy between sessions. For the time being, here's is a free workbook on anxiety and here is one on health anxiety. You can also download MindShift, a free app that uses Cognitive Behavioural Therapy AKA CBT to help you learn to relax and be mindful, develop more effective ways of thinking, and use active steps to take charge of your anxiety.
If you don't have a therapist, you can use Psychology Today's Therapy Directory to search for mental health professionals in your area (worldwide). You can search by zip code, city, last name, etc. For each provider listed, you can read about their therapy approach, specialty areas, information about their fees including whether they accept insurance and whether they offer sliding scale fees. CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) or ERP (Exposure and Response Prevention) therapy are often recommended approaches for treating OCD/health anxiety.
In the UK, you can find more info and refer yourself for therapy via NHS.
In India, you can call MPower Minds and request a referral to a therapist who treats OCD or who has experience with CBT therapy. Additional affordable mental health resource lists for India are here.
In the Philippines, you can call a crisis line by dialing 0995 356 5332. You can find a list of mental heath treatment centers here. For free mental health services and consultations, see the list here (halfway down the page).
If you're in the US, your local Mental Health America affiliate resource center is an excellent resource for information about local programs and services including affordable treatment services. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's Health Information Network (SHIN) has a Mental Health Facilities Locator that can also help you find community outpatient, inpatient and residential treatment facilities, including affordable mental health services in your area.
For peer support in the US, including referrals to resources in your area, you can call 800-950-NAMI (6264), Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. — 10 p.m., ET, or send an email to info@nami.org. The NAMI HelpLine is a free, nationwide peer-support service providing information, resource referrals and support to people living with a mental health condition, their family members and caregivers, mental health providers and the public. NAMI also holds peer-led support groups in person across the US.
Skunk has collected some videos with techniques for controlling anxiety and coping skills to facilitate living a healthier, more peaceful existence. Every time you want to look up anything about rabies, try these things instead:
Rabies OCD Illness Anxiety in depth with a medical doctor and professoPHD of immunology and biotechnology - https://youtu.be/tGHz_pJHPjs?si=c1gpWKjdl8atHGPx
Clinical Psychiatrist's Step by Step Guide to Anxiety and Panic Attacks - https://youtu.be/GTwTpXINW7I?si=MjLO0ooihkwslNIb
A walkthrough of a panic attack, to be watched during an attack, to help you get through it - https://youtu.be/2CQpyA485wc?si=_1fPyS66dBEuBx3B
Guided Meditation to help calm anxiety and get through an anxiety attack - https://youtu.be/9DA380fzy7o?si=9xL6qFIxNxxsZWNV
Understanding health anxiety and the cycle of reassurance - https://youtu.be/ICiRXi3s9vo?si=Se_XNhsMQN4F7XEU
Coping Skills for those with Health Anxiety / Illness Anxiety - https://youtu.be/rHz2zZ1qkOw?si=nO1AVO4wp_i9I1_c
5 Things You MUST STOP Doing if You Have Health Anxiety / Illness Anxiety - https://youtu.be/zqrjE6w5kWs?si=eAvfOLRzb5qxIvya
(Hindi) Rabies Phobia Diacussion woth a Psychiatrist - https://youtu.be/cdxfLBdojsg?si=Dpl6XF89LsGaK1tV
4 Ways to Stop Intrusive Thoughts & the Anxiety Cycle (Cognitive Defusion) - https://youtu.be/V3vhXQy48jo?si=dpMfxrsmGZD8IHp9
OCD and Anxiety channel (with many helpful videos) - https://youtube.com/@ocdandanxiety?si=zMczxj5sHCdTsoks
submitted by SchrodingersMinou to rabies [link] [comments]
Many people use this sub to seek reassurance for their fears. This is not helpful for managing a rabies phobia or obsession. OCD has a helpful page about reassurance-seeking.
Therapy and treatment are crucial to recover from OCD/health anxiety. Please don’t Google anything about bats or rabies but focus on accessing resources and recovering from your fears. You can check out OCD and HealthAnxiety for support and information. You can find a resource list here, which is geared towards relationship OCD but also includes a lot of information about OCD in general, including FAQs, workbooks, book recommendations, Youtube videos, apps, podcasts, and videos of kittens.
Here is a list of free crisis helplines around the world. Here is another crisis helpline directory that includes additional countries. In areas where 211 is available, dialing this number can connect you with mental health crisis services in your area or help you find where to seek immediate help in your area. If you're in the US, you can text "MHA" to 741-741 to have a text chat with a trained crisis counselor at the Crisis Text Line, or call 1-800-749-2673 for the NAMI Crisis Helpline.
You can ask your therapist if they have any workbooks or guides they can send you home with so that you can continue practicing and working on your therapy between sessions. For the time being, here's is a free workbook on anxiety and here is one on health anxiety. You can also download MindShift, a free app that uses Cognitive Behavioural Therapy AKA CBT to help you learn to relax and be mindful, develop more effective ways of thinking, and use active steps to take charge of your anxiety.
If you don't have a therapist, you can use Psychology Today's Therapy Directory to search for mental health professionals in your area (worldwide). You can search by zip code, city, last name, etc. For each provider listed, you can read about their therapy approach, specialty areas, information about their fees including whether they accept insurance and whether they offer sliding scale fees. CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) or ERP (Exposure and Response Prevention) therapy are often recommended approaches for treating OCD/health anxiety.
In the UK, you can find more info and refer yourself for therapy via NHS.
In India, you can call MPower Minds and request a referral to a therapist who treats OCD or who has experience with CBT therapy. Additional affordable mental health resource lists for India are here.
In the Philippines, you can call a crisis line by dialing 0995 356 5332. You can find a list of mental heath treatment centers here. For free mental health services and consultations, see the list here (halfway down the page).
If you're in the US, your local Mental Health America affiliate resource center is an excellent resource for information about local programs and services including affordable treatment services. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's Health Information Network (SHIN) has a Mental Health Facilities Locator that can also help you find community outpatient, inpatient and residential treatment facilities, including affordable mental health services in your area.
For peer support in the US, including referrals to resources in your area, you can call 800-950-NAMI (6264), Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. — 10 p.m., ET, or send an email to info@nami.org. The NAMI HelpLine is a free, nationwide peer-support service providing information, resource referrals and support to people living with a mental health condition, their family members and caregivers, mental health providers and the public. NAMI also holds peer-led support groups in person across the US.
Skunk has collected some videos with techniques for controlling anxiety and coping skills to facilitate living a healthier, more peaceful existence. Every time you want to look up anything about rabies, try these things instead:
Rabies OCD Illness Anxiety in depth with a medical doctor and professoPHD of immunology and biotechnology - https://youtu.be/tGHz_pJHPjs?si=c1gpWKjdl8atHGPx
Clinical Psychiatrist's Step by Step Guide to Anxiety and Panic Attacks - https://youtu.be/GTwTpXINW7I?si=MjLO0ooihkwslNIb
A walkthrough of a panic attack, to be watched during an attack, to help you get through it - https://youtu.be/2CQpyA485wc?si=_1fPyS66dBEuBx3B
Guided Meditation to help calm anxiety and get through an anxiety attack - https://youtu.be/9DA380fzy7o?si=9xL6qFIxNxxsZWNV
Understanding health anxiety and the cycle of reassurance - https://youtu.be/ICiRXi3s9vo?si=Se_XNhsMQN4F7XEU
Coping Skills for those with Health Anxiety / Illness Anxiety - https://youtu.be/rHz2zZ1qkOw?si=nO1AVO4wp_i9I1_c
5 Things You MUST STOP Doing if You Have Health Anxiety / Illness Anxiety - https://youtu.be/zqrjE6w5kWs?si=eAvfOLRzb5qxIvya
(Hindi) Rabies Phobia Diacussion woth a Psychiatrist - https://youtu.be/cdxfLBdojsg?si=Dpl6XF89LsGaK1tV
4 Ways to Stop Intrusive Thoughts & the Anxiety Cycle (Cognitive Defusion) - https://youtu.be/V3vhXQy48jo?si=dpMfxrsmGZD8IHp9
OCD and Anxiety channel (with many helpful videos) - https://youtube.com/@ocdandanxiety?si=zMczxj5sHCdTsoks