Swollen eyelids after waxing

Second Time Quitting, Vent + More Health Issues - Styes??

2024.05.21 15:44 soupgirlsz Second Time Quitting, Vent + More Health Issues - Styes??

Hello everyone
I messed up and started taking FF again after I had quit for the first time. I originally started taking FF soon after I quit drinking as a means to replace that social lubrication function of alcohol, so of course it snowballed from there. I had no idea what I was getting myself into and very quickly fell into drinking 3-5 a day for a few months until I got a litany of health issues and an insane amount of credit card debt. I ended up quitting because it was destroying my relationships (moody, acting insane), my eyes looked so sunken in, my skin looked awful, and I was getting near constant UTIs and horrible urinary retention which I attributed to the kratom. It nearly destroyed my relationship in another way because my boyfriend had his own stint with kratom before I knew him and warned me about it, so something I felt like I had a handle on soon got out of control and I was hiding it from him and so reasonably he was very upset with me. I fucked around and found out. He forgave me, and I spent a week being dope sick and feeling like death and afterwards I never felt better.
Fast forward to now...
I was going through a major episode and felt like my relationship was over and I decided fuck it, I'd rather drink one of these guys instead of having a drink. I just wanted to feel better and I felt so so guilty about it. Obviously I couldn't have just one, it's so habitual, and I'm back in the thick of it. I haven't had the pee problems this time, but I have been hanging out at a kava bar almost every day and got a bad bout of kava dermopathy (crocodile skin) and have had to slow down on that but obviously can't stop FF cold turkey and still be able to go to work, do daily tasks, etc. I need 3-4 days blocked off in order to overcome this and away from my boyfriend to be able to handle the withdrawals on my own without raising any red flags. I feel so guilty.
I mention the dermopathy because my newest condition that I suspect is related to these little shits is styes, which I suspect is kava related this time rather than kratom related based on the limited research I've done. Something about the kavalactones. I've never had a stye in my life, and now all of the sudden after my dermopathy had begun to clear up, I got like 5 styes stacked on top of each other on my left eyelid. My boyfriend popped them despite my pleas to let them be and sort themselves out but I am glad he did, because the relief was unimaginable. My eyelashes were getting caught in it too, making me wonder if it was even an ingrown eyelash, but I dunno anymore... because just as I thought this awful week and a half of having a painful, swollen eyelid was over, I began to get them in my other eye, and another one is cropping up on my under eye of the original eyelid. I feel so depressed and ugly and frustrated and in pain.
I really suspect that it's these fucking FFs, but wondering about y'all's experience and if this has happened to anyone else. Thanks for letting me vent. I know what to do, I just have to find the right timing. Looking for support and others' experiences. Thank you <3
submitted by soupgirlsz to Quittingfeelfree [link] [comments]

2024.05.21 05:22 wood_chomper A man has been drinking molten wax from my candles.

I first started noticing that something was wrong around 3 months ago. At the time, I was working from home and would usually light a scented candle while I worked, which usually helped me relax and stay focused on my work. I would usually burn through a candle a week, but over time, the candles started to take less time to fully burn up. At first, I thought that this was because of a change in ingredients the company that made the candles used, but the problem persisted after I switched candle brands, which I once again blamed on the candle manufacturers.
I kept this belief for another week until the first incident. While getting up from my computer desk, which faces away from the candle, to take a quick bathroom break, I caught a glimpse of the lit candle. A two-inch layer of molten wax rested on another three-inch layer of solid wax, the wicks rising out at first and being somewhat visible through the molten layer, finally breaking the surface and being slowly burned away. The flames flickered as I swung the door open and walked out of the room. When I returned 10 minutes later, the molten layer was gone, and the wicks had been shortened so that the flames rested right above the solid layer of the wax. At first, I thought that the glass jar that contained the candle was leaking, but after a short inspection, I was only able to find two small drops of candle wax that had solidified right next to the candle on the bedside table. I still had 2 hours of work left to do, but I was too lost in thought and was unable to do any work for the rest of the day.
Every night before I go to sleep, I like to read for at least 30 minutes, and while reading, I usually light a candle. Around 4 days later, I had mostly forgotten about the incident and went back to using candles. Due to my naivety, it returned.
I fell asleep while reading with a candle lit on my bedside table. I woke up to loud slurping noises. As I opened my eyes, the brightness of the light I had not turned off almost blinded me. As my eyes tried to readjust to the light and focus on what was in front of me, I saw a somewhat humanoid dark gray to light blue blur that contrasted with the white paint on the walls behind it. Another gray line stretched from the shape's head to the candle on my bedside table. I could feel my heart skip five consecutive beats. I opened my mouth and tried to force out a scream for help, but the pressure I applied to my throat was way beyond what it was able to handle, leading me to only produce a light wheezing sound. I tried to sit up or to at least prop myself up, but my muscles failed me. Trying to push myself up with my arms felt impossible. As I stared at the figure that had suddenly appeared in my room, my eyes finally managed to focus, making it possible for me to see the intruder who was now staring at me. The figure was a man at least 7 feet tall, fully naked; he looked bloated; his eyes were bloodshot and looked like they would pop out of their sockets; at any point, his skin was a grayish light blue.
HIS LIPS
His lips extended from his mouth like an elephant's trunk, which had been split in half. The lips extended from the man's face to the candle; the flames had been put out. He was using his lips as a makeshift straw, slowly sucking up all the molten wax from the candle, which had fully liquified while I was asleep. I laid in bed, unable to move, unable to scream for help, staring until he emptied the jar. His lips retracted back to his face, the molten wax solidifying on their tips and cracking, flakes of wax falling off the man's lips and falling to the floor. The man grinned, staring at me. The ridges and gaps between the teeth were filled in with wax, making it impossible to make out where one tooth ended and the next one began. The man opened the door he was standing next to, but instead of walking out of the room, he stepped behind it. His face peered at me from above the door, and then once again, like he had done to drink the wax, the man puckered his lips, which stretched from his mouth and floated to me. I shook and tried to roll over away from him. I wanted to get up and run, but my fear had taken over my body. Tears flowed from my eyes. He kissed me on the cheek, leaving flakes of wax and light moisture. He retracted his lips and lowered his head behind the door.
I don't remember falling asleep, but when I woke up, I saw the empty glass jar, which at one point contained the candle. Even though I had hoped that what had happened was a dream, it wasn't. I still had flakes of wax on my cheek, and on my bedroom floor, the wax in the jar had disappeared. I called the police, but they were unable to find anyone in my apartment; they also could not find any evidence of a break-in.
After the break-in, I started looking for a new apartment to move to, thinking that the man was tied to the building I was in, but even though I had thrown out all of my candles, I could not stomach spending another hour in my apartment, constantly looking over my shoulder or walking around with my back pressed up against the wall to not allow it to creep up on me. Thankfully, my friend Emma was able to let me stay over at her apartment while I looked for a new one for myself.
Me and Emma have been friends since we were 8, and we've been there to support each other when times get rough. This isn’t the first time I've had to stay over at her house for an extended amount of time; in fact, I have had to stay over at Emma’s as many times as she has had to stay over at my apartment, whether it was because of evictions after losing a job, breakups, or a candle wax drinking squatter. I didn't even know if it was human. I mean, sure, it looked like one, but human lips are not supposed to do what his did, and somehow it didn't have a reaction to molten wax being poured down its esophagus. I didn't tell Emma about what happened—the details at least—I just told her that a man had broken into my house and was watching me sleep. The only people I told the truth to were my therapist and the cops, and all of them disregarded what I told them as my mind making things up after a traumatic event.
For a while, I believed what they said—I mean, why wouldn’t I?—but then I started seeing him again. For a few days, I thought it was my mind playing tricks on me again like it had done during the night of the incident. For split seconds out of the corner of my eye, I would see the outline of a tall, bloated figure. At first, they were hours apart, but after a while, it became constant. He was standing in each room I passed, in every single dark corner I glanced past, and then he spoke.
“FeeD MeEeee”
It stood in the kitchen, peering over from a small gap between the fridge and the sink, where the trash can that had been knocked over onto its side usually stood. His voice was raspy, and every word that came out of his mouth was distorted as if he were gargling water, but still, I could somehow clearly make out each word he said from over 15 feet away.
“Please just leave me alone I… why are you following me?”
I shouted at the figure, the same fear that had taken over my body during the night I saw him for the first time paralyzing me, making it impossible for me to move anything other than my eyes, eyelids, and mouth.
“i’M sTarviNg, I nEEd You To FeEd ME”
It replied again. Now, stepping out from behind the fridge, he stepped directly onto a rotten banana. Its mushy brown content’s seeping out of the peel under the pressure of his decomposing foot, which was covered in scabs, and took up the same grayish light blue color as the rest of his body. He mostly looked the same; his bloodshot eyes bulged from their sockets, but now his tongue was swollen. It peeked out from between his bloated, cracked gray lips; it stared at me, waiting for an answer.
“Ok, I’ll.. I’ll feed you, but please just... leave me alone.”
I replied, the tone of my voice shifting into high-pitched squeals with every quick breath I took. He looked satisfied by my response. He somehow squeezed his bloated body back into the gap that was at least four times smaller than him. After peering over at me from above the fridge, he bent over backwards, his spine releasing a series of sickening cracks until he was fully obscured by the fridge, and then he vanished.
Still barely in control of my body, I limped over to the couch tucked away in the back corner of the living room, it took me at least 10 minutes to steady my breathing and 20 more to fully regain control of my body again but as soon as I did I ran out the house and to the nearest store, during the 15-minute walk he stared at me through dark windows and the backs of cars, peered out at me from gaps between leaves in the trees and bushes, he even followed me into the store staring at me from the middle of deserted isles before disappearing right before my eyes were able to fully catch him, once I finally got the candles I randomly picked four off of the shelves and rushed to the self checkout.
When I arrived home, I had 2 hours before Emma got off work. I didn't want to feed it while she was home, and I didn't want her to see it. I pulled out two of the candles from the black plastic bag and placed them on the kitchen table, the first a light blue candle named “Garden Rain” and the second a red candle named “Juicy Watermelon." I pulled out a lighter from one of the drawers Emma used after her stove stopped lighting on its own and lit each of the 6 wicks on the candles. As soon as I started seeing the wax melt under the heat of the burning wicks, I dropped the lighter onto the table next to the candles and ran out of the room. I could not stomach seeing that thing again; even just thinking about it made me shudder and hyperventilate. The paralyzing fear that seeing him caused me made me want to vomit.
At least 30 minutes later I started to hear it drink even though the living room and kitchen were separated by a wall, even though I had closed the door I could still hear what at first started as slurping sounds which were followed up by loud gulps, then it stopped, and once again 30 minutes later it started drinking, as the slurping started once again I heard the door to the apartment crack open, it was Emma, as she stepped through the door I saw her carrying two large brown paper bags of groceries in her hands, she was headed to the kitchen.
“Hey let me grab those for you”
I said running over to her, my voice shaking.
“Oh, thanks. Are you… okay, you look scared?”
My eyes shot wide open in a mixture of fear and surprise. I said the first thing that came to mind.
“Yeah just umm… I didn't expect you to come home so early and I got a bit spooked”
“shit sorry, I know I should have called you, work let me off early today,”
I started to turn away from her walking to the kitchen.
Trying to keep her away from the kitchen I told her to wait for me in the living room because I wanted to talk to her about something. I didn't know what I would talk to her about but that was a problem for future me to resolve, somehow it worked.
“What's that sound?”
She called out to me while walking towards the living room couch. It took me a few seconds to come up with an excuse.
“I think it’s the sink, or the pipes at least”
I opened the door to the kitchen with my eyes closed at first hesitant to look knowing what would be greeting me. slowly prying my eyes open I started to see its outline, my muscles started to lose strength as the details of the man came into my view, I felt the grocery bags start to slip from my arms, my knees buckled, face first I fell onto the kitchen floor scattering the groceries all over the floor, I mixture of a light scream and a yelp escaped from my mouth as my body made contact with the floor, Emma concerned for my safety ran into the kitchen, she didn't scream, using all of the strength and mobility I had left in my muscles I rolled over expecting to see her face drenched in terror, her body frozen still unable to move just like my body had done the first time that I saw him, but Emma looked concerned, the man was gone, she crouched down beside me.
“Oh my god are you ok? What happened?”
I looked around observing my surroundings.
“I um… I… I tripped on the little thing at the bottom of the doorframe”
I finally managed to blurt out another excuse, not being able to remember what the name of a door sill was. I started to sit up using a part of the energy that had returned to my body, pain pulsed through my chest and arms, Emma looked at me with a concerned face.
“You've been acting really weird since I got home, are you sure you're ok?”
“Yeah… I think I’m just having one of those days you know”
The confusion on Emma’s face said that she didn’t know and to be honest I didn't either, I guess my luck of pulling random excuses out of my ass ran out, Emma thought that she triggered some sort of PTSD response after barging into the house unannounced at first apologizing then trying to change the subject to stop my trembling which I was still unsuccessfully trying to hide from her.
“Did you buy candles?”
Emma asked picking the groceries apart from the garbage that spilled out the can that the man had knocked over, placing them on the table next to the now half-empty glass jars, the flames flickered above the inch or so of molten wax the man was unable to finish drinking.
“Yeah I’ve been struggling with work lately, they usually help me focus”
“Huh Interesting combination you’ve got going on here”
She looked at me and smiled slightly, I smiled back and chuckled to seem normal.
“Yeah even I don't know what I was trying to accomplish here, to be honest”
I tried to help Emma clean up the spilled groceries but she did not let me, she told me that I needed to recover like I had been in a car crash instead of having taken a little tumble. After a few seconds of silence, Emma spoke again.
“Anyway, what did you want to talk to me about earlier?”
A quick jolt of stress shot through my body, in a jumbled mess of lies and fear I had forgotten what I had told Emma, I sat there in silence for a few seconds unable to come up with an excuse
“I…umm… I don’t remember, it wasn't anything serious though”
“Damn did you hit your head too?”
She said once again proudly smiling at her joke.
At this point Emma picked up the last bag of potato chips from the floor and placed it on the table, then she opened the fridge and started loading the groceries into it.
“Anyway I gotta go get back to work’’
I blurted out after a few more seconds of awkward silence.
“Alright well good luck”
I walked over into the living room and sat down in front of my workstation, which now consisted of a laptop sitting on a small foldable TV tray that had just barely enough room left on it to fit a small USB mouse.
The last thing I remember, before I fell asleep, was me mindlessly scrolling through apartment listings while Emma watched a random 90’s horror movie I’m positive only had a budget of $500.
I woke up with a light stinging pain shooting through my dry throat, and a dim hissing sound caused by thousands of water drops striking the ground outside filled the room. I pressed the spacebar on my laptop, the brightness of the screen blinding me temporarily, after taking a few seconds to let my eyes readjust I managed to make out the time, 3:45 AM. A strong smell I was unable to make out the origin of assaulted my nostrils. Lavender.
The smell hitting my nose had the same effect on me that I would expect smelling salts would have on a weightlifter right before they set a world record. Before I knew it my legs were moving on their own at an almost uncontrollable pace, fighting back against my mind which was telling them to slow down after years of being used to navigating both mine and Emma’s apartment as steadily as possible to not bother the neighbors.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity I stood before Emma’s bedroom door, a faint, yellow, pulsating light radiated from a lamp and snuck out of a small gap between the door and the doorframe, reluctantly I pushed my left hand up against the door, my right hand grasping onto the door frame for a sense of stability, once the door was fully agape I scanned the inside of the room my heart skipping a beat for every humanoid shadow cast up onto the wall by the lights from the wicks which were set ablaze and were being slowly burnt away.
I walked into Emma’s room and made my way over to her bedside table to put out the candle, as I stepped closer towards her, her face became more defined, I could finally make out her features, she was awake, but no she could not have been, even though her eyes were wide open they never blinked, she didn't even move slightly, as I moved closer I finally managed to fully make out the expression of pure terror on her face, her mouth wide agape as if she was about to release a deafening screach, but she could not have, a single drop of solidified wax dribbled out of the corner of her mouth and clung to her cheek, my eyes traced the cream colored path back towards her mouth, first up her cheek then between the corner of her mouth and finally behind her teeth, there instead of her tongue or the roof of her mouth I saw a wall of wax which had filled in the entirety of her mouth.
I fell to my knees and hunched forward supporting my body weight with my arms, I was too late, I resisted the urge to vomit and got back up onto my feet, a mixture of tears and snot slid down my face and onto my lips, shaking now I slowly started limping over towards my phone which I had left on the couch next to where I had awoken just minutes before, just minutes before my life was destroyed because of my lies if I had just told Emma what I had gone through, if I had just told her what had happened on the night of the incident which now seemed trivial, even if she thought that I was crazy, I know that she would have complied just to make me feel comfortable.
It took me at least 30 seconds of repeated attempts to stabilize my hands enough to properly dial 911. “Someone broke into my apartment and hurt my friend” was the only reasonable explanation I could come up with that would not get the operator to hang up on me thinking that this was a prank call.
I sat there in the living room for an agonizing 10 minutes, crying, my sadness slowly transformed into anger towards myself, and my mind raced thinking of all the lies I’d told, I kept thinking that if I had just told her the truth she would not have been laying there in her bed, her body bloated, “every single orifice has signs of forced penetration and has been filled with what seems to be candle wax” is what was written on her autopsy report.
For a few days I was the main suspect in Emma’s murder, but due to the almost unstoppable crying and the unresponsive state that I was in when the police arrived, mixed with the lack of evidence of me having a way to produce 30 pounds of candle wax led to me being released out of police custody, but because I was the main suspect I was not told any details about what had fully happened to Emma, for days all I had to work off of was the image of her face frozen in terror, and a short glance I caught of her bloated body as she was being carted out on a stretcher.
I recounted every single word of our last conversations over and over again until they became permanently etched into my brain.
Emma’s parents originally wanted to cremate her, as that is what she had somewhat jokingly asked for whenever the topic of funerals came up, well she had joked about wanting to have had unpopped popcorn shoved down her throat before she was sent off to “scare the shit out of the guy cremating me” but due to all the wax which would have been impossible to get out of her body they were forced to bury her.
A few days before Emma’s funeral her body disappeared.
After Emma’s death, her parents took me into their home, after reading the autopsy reports and seeing her corpse they had thrown out every single candle they owned which made their home the safest choice I had, still, this did not stop me from buying a machete and keeping it under my bed, just in case.
I was laying on the bed in their guest bedroom The day that the police informed Emma’s parents about her disappearance, the bedroom is right above the front porch of the house, at first I heard them ring the doorbell which was followed up by 3 powerful knocks on the door, for about a minute I laid there on the bed listening to muffled voices exchanging distorted words I was barely able to make out which slowly transformed into distorted weeps, curious I lifted myself up from the bed, made my way over to the window and carefully lifted the bottom panel making Shure to not make too much noise, the distorted muffled sounds started forming into coherent words “We checked the security footage but the only strange thing we could see was a 5 second time jump” one of the officers spoke in a serious and almost monotone voice “which meant that the security guard who was the only person in the building had to climb down 2 flights of stairs walk through a 40 foot long hallway and then drag her body back up stairs and out of the building in 5 seconds” Emma’s mom let out yelp “ but don’t worry ma'am that’s actually good news because we know that her corpse is still somewhere within the building and was probably brought to the wrong floor by an intern, we’ve already warned all of the staff at the hospital to keep an eye out, and we also sent 5 officers to search the hospital”
I could not believe what I was hearing, my breathing quickened, but this time instead of fear I felt anger, that fucker stole her corpse and was probably in the weird separate plane of existence he always went back to after terrorizing me, cutting off chunks of her body, melting her, and drinking her.
I closed the window Emma’s mom's cries once again turned into a muffled rumble which was only possible to make out if you knew what to look for, I took a few steps back away from the window planning to lay back down, not wanting to bother Emma’s parents. I bumped into something, not something, someone, its fleshy towering form as solid as a wall sent me tumbling forward, I knew it was him, he had returned to take me too, to stretch his swollen cracked lips, push them down my esophagus, fill my lungs and stomach with wax. But despite all of that this time I was not scared, I was angry, and I was not going to stand there in terror like I had the last time I saw him.
I fell forward onto my knees my face missing the window sill just by mere inches, I put my hands onto the floor, lifted one of my knees, and rotated 180 degrees now facing the monster, to the right of him pushed up against the wall was the bed, light from the sun reflected off of the metallic button which kept my machete in it’s sheathe, the man started to stretch his lips, they were moving towards me, waving a wiggling through the air like a snake slithering towards me.
I dove towards the bed one of my feet pushing off of the floor and the other pushing against the wall which creaked under the pressure applied to it, I flew for a few moments before slamming down onto the carpet and sliding forward, the heat generated by my skin brushing against the carpet released a sharp stinging pain throughout my body, my outstretched arm landed just a few inches short of the machete, I quickly bent my arms, pushing my body up and crawled towards the machete. my fingers wrapped around the handle I spun around, my back pushed up against the bedside table, once again facing the man, he was still facing the window but his lips faced me and were just a few feet away from me, for what felt like minutes but was most likely no longer than a second, I struggled to hook my finger under the strap securing the machete into its sheath, as the lips inched towards me the man started producing gurgling noises, he was regurgitation wax.
I finally pulled the machete out of its sheath, I swung the blade at the man's lips, the blade was not met with any resistance as it sliced through the man’s lips which landed on the carpeted floor with an audible thud, the man did not have a physical reaction to my counter-attack, his lips kept creeping towards me, once again I slashed at the lips, still no reaction, I repeated this at least 3 more times.
I wanted to kill him, I wanted to take revenge for what he had done to Emma, but fighting back was pointless. I realized that no matter how much I tried to hurt it, I could not kill him, I could not get rid of him.
My rage dissipated and a mixture of fear and sadness crept in, and soon took over my body, I screamed for help, I screamed in fear, in agony, tears streamed down my face as the man's lips finally reached my face, he wasn’t met with any resistance as his lips snuck between mine, pried my jaw open and finally started to slide down my esophagus.
I heard the cops run up the stairs, they started banging on the door asking if I was okay only to have been met with muffled screams, hot wax started to pour down inside of me, the stinging pain of the heat made me want to plunge the machete which I had dropped onto the ground next to me into my stomach to create a gaping wound that the wax would hopefully funnel out of, the texture of the man's slippery, oily lips matched with the poison like flavor of the wax caused me to start gagging, I felt my insides bulging like at any moment my intestines would have been filled to the point where they would pop, I wanted to vomit, the drain myself of the filth I was filled with, but his lips had plugged my throat not allowing anything to get out.
Hearing my muffled screams the cops started kicking the door down, the man retracted his lips, the suction aided my attempts at cleansing my insides, I got onto my hands and knees streams of molten wax pouring out of me, solidifying on the the carpet, with another loud thud the door swung open slamming into the wall, the man was gone.
That’s the last thing I remember before I passed out, but according to one of the doctors who was in the ambulance that brought me to the hospital, I was still semi-responsive during the first 10 minutes of the ride to the hospital.
Approximately 13.4 pounds of wax were removed from my body, the doctors said that I was in a critical condition and some of them did not expect me to make it.
One of the officers who was there the day the man attacked me took a report of what had happened to me, due to the unmistakable evidence of what had happened to both me and Emma, and the fact that this was the 3rd instance of me reporting something like this the police finally started investigating who this man might have been.
Around a month later I was discharged from the hospital and once again have been staying in the living room of Emma’s parent's house.
I’ve been seeing the man again, candles were not allowed in the hospital I stayed at, which means that he’s probably very hungry, he’s close to attacking me again, I know it, he wants to finish what he started and I don't know if I have the power to fight back, I’m not sure if defeating him is even possible, I’m tired.
I’ve been seeing Emma too, her bloated, reanimated corpse often appears to be standing next to the man. If I let him take me will I get to join them? I’ve tried asking but they don’t answer, they just stare, I can’t keep living in constant fear, always looking over my shoulder, I miss Emma.
submitted by wood_chomper to scarystories [link] [comments]

2024.05.20 09:23 MarvSee How to Clean Dog Ears - All Informations

Keeping your dog's ears clean is essential for their overall health and well-being. Dirty ears can lead to infections and discomfort for your furry friend. In this article, we'll walk you through the process of cleaning your dog's ears effectively and safely.

Understanding Dog Ear Anatomy

Structure of a Dog's Ear

Dogs have a unique ear structure that includes the outer ear (pinna), the ear canal, and the inner ear. The ear canal is L-shaped, which can make it prone to trapping dirt and debris.

Types of Ears (Floppy vs. Erect)

Different breeds have different ear types. Floppy ears, like those of Cocker Spaniels, can be more prone to infections due to limited airflow, while erect ears, like those of German Shepherds, may stay cleaner but are still at risk.

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Signs Your Dog’s Ears Need Cleaning

Common Indicators of Dirty Ears

Look out for the following signs that indicate your dog’s ears need cleaning:

Symptoms of Ear Infections

If your dog’s ears are red, swollen, or have a discharge, they might have an ear infection and should see a vet immediately.

Preparing to Clean Your Dog’s Ears

Gathering Necessary Supplies

Before you start, make sure you have:

Creating a Calm Environment

Choose a quiet, comfortable place to clean your dog’s ears. Make sure your dog is relaxed and comfortable to make the process easier.

Step-by-Step Guide to Cleaning Dog Ears

Inspecting the Ears

Gently lift your dog’s ear and look inside for any signs of redness, swelling, or discharge. If you notice anything unusual, consult your vet before cleaning.

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Applying Ear Cleaning Solution

Pour a small amount of ear cleaning solution into your dog’s ear canal. Be careful not to insert the applicator too deeply.

Massaging the Ear Base

Gently massage the base of your dog’s ear for about 20-30 seconds. This helps the cleaning solution break up any wax or debris.

Wiping Out Debris

Use a cotton ball or gauze to wipe away any loosened debris from the ear. Avoid using cotton swabs as they can push debris further into the ear canal.

Choosing the Right Ear Cleaning Solution

Commercial Ear Cleaners

There are many vet-approved ear cleaning solutions available. Choose one that is specifically formulated for dogs and follow the instructions carefully.

Homemade Solutions

You can also make a mild ear cleaning solution at home using equal parts of water and white vinegar. However, consult your vet before using any homemade remedies.

Dos and Don’ts of Ear Cleaning

What to Avoid

Best Practices

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Preventive Measures

Regular Ear Checks

Check your dog’s ears weekly for any signs of dirt, wax buildup, or infections. Regular monitoring can help you catch issues early.

Maintaining Ear Hygiene

Keep your dog’s ears dry and clean, especially after baths or swimming. Moisture can lead to infections, so be sure to dry their ears thoroughly.

When to See a Vet

Persistent Problems

If your dog’s ear issues persist despite regular cleaning, consult your vet. They may need a more thorough examination or prescription treatment.

Signs of Serious Infections

If your dog shows signs of severe pain, swelling, or discharge, it’s important to seek veterinary care immediately.

Conclusion

Regular ear cleaning is essential for your dog’s health. By following these steps and maintaining good ear hygiene, you can prevent infections and keep your dog comfortable. Remember to check your dog’s ears regularly and consult your vet if you notice any persistent issues.

FAQs

How often should I clean my dog's ears?

It depends on your dog’s breed and ear type, but generally, once a month is a good rule of thumb. Dogs with floppy ears may need more frequent cleaning.

What should I do if my dog resists ear cleaning?

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Can I use cotton swabs to clean my dog’s ears?

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Are there any risks to cleaning my dog's ears?

If done improperly, ear cleaning can cause irritation or infection. Always be gentle and use vet-approved solutions.

How can I prevent ear infections in my dog?

Regular ear cleaning, keeping your dog’s ears dry, and monitoring for signs of infection can help prevent ear problems.

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2024.05.19 14:10 iwokeupabillionare Annie Who Are You? L'inconnue de la Seine. The Girl who never drowned.

Context
Michael Jackson’s song 'Smooth Criminal' featured on his seventh album Bad (1987). The song is about a woman being attacked in their apartment. It used the refrain “Annie Are You Ok?” which is used to teach students CPR on CPR mannequin Annie (Wikipedia, 2023). “Resusci Anne was developed by the Norwegian toy maker Åsmund S. Lærdal and the Austrian-Czech physician Peter Safar and American physician James Elam” (Wikipedia, 2023). The oldest version is the proto-CPR mannequin of the world. It was invented after Asmund “was alerted to… physicians and engineers in Baltimore that had a new and much more effective method for resuscitation, involving mouth-to-mouth breathing”. The creation was sentimental as Tore, his son, had experienced drowning. The doll was modelled after the face of the death mask, ‘L’ inconnue de la Seine’ translated from French to English meaning ‘The unknown of the Seine’ (A rich heritage, 2023). They chose the face of a young female as male doctors would’ve felt uncomfortable practising on a same-sexed doll . Additionally, to resurrect a girl “millions of times is at the centre of a macabre mystery.”
Legend
Legend states, a young female corpse was pulled from the river Seine, the death mask was moulded on the corpse's face by a pathologist as they were beheld by her beauty. The corpse awaited with other bodies for identification which never came in the Paris Morgue. This practise was real as “two-thirds of the corpses dealt with by the morgue fished out of the Seine" were "suicides, accidental drownings or murders” (The Guardian, 2007).
Eric Nadeau stated "the pathologist asked for a mould to be made of the young woman’s face and the closest moulder was [their] very own Michel Lorenzi who founded Artlier Lorenzi, a molding workshop founded in 1871 “19, Rue Racine” (Morgan, 2017) . A suggestion from a now deleted post by users: and the link provided by in this thread provided contradicting info, Phoebe Judge stated that Eric Nardeau stated that the mask wasn’t created of a corpse, but Lorenzi stated in a 1914 French interview, but of a living model in 1866. The mask was made due to the model's popularity with other artists (The unknown woman, p.8, 2023).
According to Nadeau: “Michel Lorenzi, who was from an old moulding family based in a small village near Lucca, Italy and arrived in Paris around 1850” (Morgan, 2017). Although, another source stated that “Michel had a house in Piano. di Coreglia, came to settle in Paris around 1868” (Monumentsmorts, n.d). It's possible the mask wasn't created in France but Italy according to the date Michel Lorenzi moved and the creation year of the mask provided by Nadeau.
Debunkers
Claire Forestier, a descendant of the original Lorenzi stated the death mask’s face has " full, rounded cheeks ... smooth skin…[usually akin to] casts taken from living faces [as they are] are so clear, so detailed, that when you look at the eyelids you can just see the eyeballs' movement underneath. That's the case with the Inconnue" (The Guardian, 2007).
“… moored at their headquarters near the Pont d'Austerlitz, Chief Brigadier Pascal Jacquin was less than convinced that the girl was dead when the mask was made” according to them “the drowned and suicides, they never look so peaceful. They're swollen, they don't look nice" (Grange, 2013).
"In 1960, Pierre Lièvre reported to the magazine "Chercheurs et Curieux." The interview stated the then owner of Atelier Lorenzi's ancestor (presumably Michel Lorenzi) had "molded the Inconnue at the request of a forensic doctor, as quoted on March 28, 2020 in the "Cousu Main editions blog titled "L'Inconnue de la Seine" on cousumain.worldpress.com"". The writer Jean Ducourneau, whilst writing The Church of Céline "(referenced below) [35, 36]", made a visit to rue Racine, they wrote the found that the mask "had been lifted on the face of a very pretty workshop model, reminding us that it is technically impossible for this mask to have been lifted on a corpse," reiterating the technical impossibility of this veil being lifted from a deceased body. "(In fact very quickly the rigidity cadaver blocks the mandibular joint and the smile would rather have been a rictus or a grimace)"
Origin of the Legend
“The name L'Inconnue de la Seine is quite late and probably dates from Ernst Benkard's collection of photographs in 1926 [25, 26] … placed the Unknown Woman of the Seine on the cover of his collection of death masks, Das ewige Antlitz (The Eternal Face) [Figure 20]. The book was published in 1926. The myth of her death mask probably originates from Rainer Maria Rilke’s Cahiers de Malte Laurids Brigge, published in Germany in 1910, in French 1911*.* “Rilke arrived in Paris in 1902 and stayed at 3 rue de l'Abbé-de-l'Épée near rue Racine. [He] mentions the mask of the Unknown woman associated with that of Beethoven, in the window of the molder Lorenzi, rue Racine. “The face of the young drowned woman that was cast in the morgue, because it was beautiful and because it smiled, because it smiled so deceptively . ". [23L page 72 Points edition] [Figure 11].” (Jean-Pierre, 2022).
Beginning Art History
According to Gaelle-Salliot (2017), Lorenzi’s grandniece stated that the death mask was first used for the 19th tetes d’expression at Ecole Beaux Arts. The author cited Edourd Papet’s (2008, p. 20) fact that the death mask was earliest depicted in Charles Bargue and Jean Leon-Gerome’s cours de dessin a drawing manual which features a drawing of Homer. She is depicted in Figure 2 (Gaëlle-Salliot, 2017, p.7). This drawing manual didn't reference a story of that of a drowned girl etc.
Potential real facts about the Jane Doe
An alternative name for the live cast is ‘La Belle Italienne’, from Frenct to English meaning, ‘The Beautiful Italian’. “Several plaster casts manufacturer in the United States added a portrait of the girl in their [catalogue] collection, but in all [catalogues] she is named as La Belle Italienne. Why Italian?. This is a curious fact, it is a true information or an error because the girl was unknown?” She is seen with the name in “P.P. Caproni & Bro. Boston, Plastic Arts. 1911 cat [-ologue]. Masks n° 13525 La Belle Italienne, from life $ 1,00” (Felice, 2012). “Forestier thinks she must have been at most 16 for her skin to be so firm and smooth” (The Guardian, 2007). “According to the draughtsman Georges Villa, who received this information from his master, the painter Jules Joseph Lefebvre, the impression was taken from the face of a young model who died of tuberculosis around 1875, but no trace of the original cast remained” (M, Bessy, 1981 cited by Wikipedia, 2023)”. However, according to Marious Grout, the model was famous and working for “artists around 1875” (Gaëlle-Salliot, pp.6-7, 2015).
False leads
According to Alvarez (2015) the model of the mask gained success in Germany with their father in a Hamburg factory that reproduced the mask (Gaëlle-Salliot, 2017). This fact doesn’t lead to anywhere. She was also identified as a Russian prostitute named Valerie who committed suicide, buried in Pere- Lachaise (Gaëlle-Salliot, 2017). Although, this comes from the fictional book The Mask by William Wood (G. E. W. H, 1951, p.6). As well as, Ewa Lazlo, a creation of John Goto, who wrote a fictional investigative story identifying the model. They “assumed that people would have a postmodern view and treat it as fictional," and they "really didn't expect [people] to take it seriously" as people online took his story to be factual (Grange, 2013).
Conclusion
She has the artistic reverence and mystery of a once youthful girl alike Afghan girl. “In light of the Cold War, the portrait was described as the "First World's Third World Mona Lisa"” according to S. Hesford and Kozol (2005) cited by Wikipedia, 2023. A title formally given to L’ inconnue de la Seine “because of her mysterious smile, “Mona Lisa of suicide” (Aragon)” (Jean-Pierre, 2022). The legend casts a great shadow over her identity, as the story ends with a corpse; she is muse who’s story is reinvented time and time again. It is possible that not resources all have been exhausted, there is potentially more information that could be obtained by the Artlier Lorenzi. Additionally, we still don’t known the causes-effects that lead to Georges Villa obtaining information about her, it is possible that other documents about this figure exist from this contemporary art community . If this person is Italian - a small possibility – this person’s life could have been documented in Italian records waiting for a face to match the details.
TLDR: An unidentified model possibly of Italian origin, was used to create a live cast of a bust. It was recreated repeatedly. The bust was misreported to a be a “death mask” of girl who drowned in the river Seine, in late 19th century France, from a pathologist in awe of her beauty created the mask. Long after, she became a muse for many artists. Then, she became the model of the first CPR doll in the 1960s. Finally, the victim of a melodic tragedy ‘Smooth Criminal’. No one knows the model’s identity.
Fact-file
Name: Unknown
Age: 16+/- (The Guardian, 2007)
Born: 1850+/- (Based upon the possible creation year of the mask from The unknown woman, p.8, 2023 and possible age range of the model from the Guardian, 2007)
Modelled: 1866? (The Unknown woman, p.8, 2023)
Death year: 1875? (Bessy, 1981 cited by Wikipedia, 2023)
Death cause: Tuberculosis? (Bessy, 1981 cited by Wikipedia, 2023)
Ethnicity: Italian? (Felice, 2012)
Occupation: Model for live casts
Place of work: Lucca, Italy (LORENZI Pierre- Sculptor, n.d) or Artlier Lorenzi, France (Morgan, 2017)?
Employer: Michel Lorenzi (The Guardian, 2007 et al.)
References:
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2024.05.19 11:32 Outrageous-River5987 [25M] Medical mystery, neuro and skin symptoms post infection

My crazy symptoms after strange infection - neurological and flushing
In august last year I had strong infection, I was sweating by month, extreme fatigue, swollen lymph node under armpit.
Since then I have tons of symptons:
Here are pics of my red face flushed:
https://ibb.co/album/WWw7VS
Bloodwork is ok. Is it some kind of long covid? Taking gabapentin, doesnt help too much. Antihistamines doesnt work (ketotifen too) so not MCAS..Please, tell me which lab tests should I take. Please, I feel like a living dead.
submitted by Outrageous-River5987 to AskDocs [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 07:21 wood_chomper A man had been drinking molten wax from my candles.

I first started noticing that something was wrong around 3 months ago. At the time, I was working from home and would usually light a scented candle while I worked, which usually helped me relax and stay focused on my work. I would usually burn through a candle a week, but over time, the candles started to take less time to fully burn up. At first, I thought that this was because of a change in ingredients the company that made the candles used, but the problem persisted after I switched candle brands, which I once again blamed on the candle manufacturers.
I kept this belief for another week until the first incident. While getting up from my computer desk, which faces away from the candle, to take a quick bathroom break, I caught a glimpse of the lit candle. A two-inch layer of molten wax rested on another three-inch layer of solid wax, the wicks rising out at first and being somewhat visible through the molten layer, finally breaking the surface and being slowly burned away. The flames flickered as I swung the door open and walked out of the room. When I returned 10 minutes later, the molten layer was gone, and the wicks had been shortened so that the flames rested right above the solid layer of the wax. At first, I thought that the glass jar that contained the candle was leaking, but after a short inspection, I was only able to find two small drops of candle wax that had solidified right next to the candle on the bedside table. I still had 2 hours of work left to do, but I was too lost in thought and was unable to do any work for the rest of the day.
Every night before I go to sleep, I like to read for at least 30 minutes, and while reading, I usually light a candle. Around 4 days later, I had mostly forgotten about the incident and went back to using candles. Due to my naivety, it returned.
I fell asleep while reading with a candle lit on my bedside table. I woke up to loud slurping noises. As I opened my eyes, the brightness of the light I had not turned off almost blinded me. As my eyes tried to readjust to the light and focus on what was in front of me, I saw a somewhat humanoid dark gray to light blue blur that contrasted with the white paint on the walls behind it. Another gray line stretched from the shape's head to the candle on my bedside table. I could feel my heart skip five consecutive beats. I opened my mouth and tried to force out a scream for help, but the pressure I applied to my throat was way beyond what it was able to handle, leading me to only produce a light wheezing sound. I tried to sit up or to at least prop myself up, but my muscles failed me. Trying to push myself up with my arms felt impossible. As I stared at the figure that had suddenly appeared in my room, my eyes finally managed to focus, making it possible for me to see the intruder who was now staring at me. The figure was a man at least 7 feet tall, fully naked; he looked bloated; his eyes were bloodshot and looked like they would pop out of their sockets; at any point, his skin was a grayish light blue.
HIS LIPS
His lips extended from his mouth like an elephant's trunk, which had been split in half. The lips extended from the man's face to the candle; the flames had been put out. He was using his lips as a makeshift straw, slowly sucking up all the molten wax from the candle, which had fully liquified while I was asleep. I laid in bed, unable to move, unable to scream for help, staring until he emptied the jar. His lips retracted back to his face, the molten wax solidifying on their tips and cracking, flakes of wax falling off the man's lips and falling to the floor. The man grinned, staring at me. The ridges and gaps between the teeth were filled in with wax, making it impossible to make out where one tooth ended and the next one began. The man opened the door he was standing next to, but instead of walking out of the room, he stepped behind it. His face peered at me from above the door, and then once again, like he had done to drink the wax, the man puckered his lips, which stretched from his mouth and floated to me. I shook and tried to roll over away from him. I wanted to get up and run, but my fear had taken over my body. Tears flowed from my eyes. He kissed me on the cheek, leaving flakes of wax and light moisture. He retracted his lips and lowered his head behind the door.
I don't remember falling asleep, but when I woke up, I saw the empty glass jar, which at one point contained the candle. Even though I had hoped that what had happened was a dream, it wasn't. I still had flakes of wax on my cheek, and on my bedroom floor, the wax in the jar had disappeared. I called the police, but they were unable to find anyone in my apartment; they also could not find any evidence of a break-in.
After the break-in, I started looking for a new apartment to move to, thinking that the man was tied to the building I was in, but even though I had thrown out all of my candles, I could not stomach spending another hour in my apartment, constantly looking over my shoulder or walking around with my back pressed up against the wall to not allow it to creep up on me. Thankfully, my friend Emma was able to let me stay over at her apartment while I looked for a new one for myself.
Me and Emma have been friends since we were 8, and we've been there to support each other when times get rough. This isn’t the first time I've had to stay over at her house for an extended amount of time; in fact, I have had to stay over at Emma’s as many times as she has had to stay over at my apartment, whether it was because of evictions after losing a job, breakups, or a candle wax drinking squatter. I didn't even know if it was human. I mean, sure, it looked like one, but human lips are not supposed to do what his did, and somehow it didn't have a reaction to molten wax being poured down its esophagus. I didn't tell Emma about what happened—the details at least—I just told her that a man had broken into my house and was watching me sleep. The only people I told the truth to were my therapist and the cops, and all of them disregarded what I told them as my mind making things up after a traumatic event.
For a while, I believed what they said—I mean, why wouldn’t I?—but then I started seeing him again. For a few days, I thought it was my mind playing tricks on me again like it had done during the night of the incident. For split seconds out of the corner of my eye, I would see the outline of a tall, bloated figure. At first, they were hours apart, but after a while, it became constant. He was standing in each room I passed, in every single dark corner I glanced past, and then he spoke.
“FeeD MeEeee”
It stood in the kitchen, peering over from a small gap between the fridge and the sink, where the trash can that had been knocked over onto its side usually stood. His voice was raspy, and every word that came out of his mouth was distorted as if he were gargling water, but still, I could somehow clearly make out each word he said from over 15 feet away.
“Please just leave me alone I… why are you following me?”
I shouted at the figure, the same fear that had taken over my body during the night I saw him for the first time paralyzing me, making it impossible for me to move anything other than my eyes, eyelids, and mouth.
“i’M sTarviNg, I nEEd You To FeEd ME”
It replied again. Now, stepping out from behind the fridge, he stepped directly onto a rotten banana. Its mushy brown content’s seeping out of the peel under the pressure of his decomposing foot, which was covered in scabs, and took up the same grayish light blue color as the rest of his body. He mostly looked the same; his bloodshot eyes bulged from their sockets, but now his tongue was swollen. It peeked out from between his bloated, cracked gray lips; it stared at me, waiting for an answer.
“Ok, I’ll.. I’ll feed you, but please just... leave me alone.”
I replied, the tone of my voice shifting into high-pitched squeals with every quick breath I took. He looked satisfied by my response. He somehow squeezed his bloated body back into the gap that was at least four times smaller than him. After peering over at me from above the fridge, he bent over backwards, his spine releasing a series of sickening cracks until he was fully obscured by the fridge, and then he vanished.
Still barely in control of my body, I limped over to the couch tucked away in the back corner of the living room, it took me at least 10 minutes to steady my breathing and 20 more to fully regain control of my body again but as soon as I did I ran out the house and to the nearest store, during the 15-minute walk he stared at me through dark windows and the backs of cars, peered out at me from gaps between leaves in the trees and bushes, he even followed me into the store staring at me from the middle of deserted isles before disappearing right before my eyes were able to fully catch him, once I finally got the candles I randomly picked four off of the shelves and rushed to the self checkout.
When I arrived home, I had 2 hours before Emma got off work. I didn't want to feed it while she was home, and I didn't want her to see it. I pulled out two of the candles from the black plastic bag and placed them on the kitchen table, the first a light blue candle named “Garden Rain” and the second a red candle named “Juicy Watermelon." I pulled out a lighter from one of the drawers Emma used after her stove stopped lighting on its own and lit each of the 6 wicks on the candles. As soon as I started seeing the wax melt under the heat of the burning wicks, I dropped the lighter onto the table next to the candles and ran out of the room. I could not stomach seeing that thing again; even just thinking about it made me shudder and hyperventilate. The paralyzing fear that seeing him caused me made me want to vomit.
At least 30 minutes later I started to hear it drink even though the living room and kitchen were separated by a wall, even though I had closed the door I could still hear what at first started as slurping sounds which were followed up by loud gulps, then it stopped, and once again 30 minutes later it started drinking, as the slurping started once again I heard the door to the apartment crack open, it was Emma, as she stepped through the door I saw her carrying two large brown paper bags of groceries in her hands, she was headed to the kitchen.
“Hey let me grab those for you”
I said running over to her, my voice shaking.
“Oh, thanks. Are you… okay, you look scared?”
My eyes shot wide open in a mixture of fear and surprise. I said the first thing that came to mind.
“Yeah just umm… I didn't expect you to come home so early and I got a bit spooked”
“shit sorry, I know I should have called you, work let me off early today,”
I started to turn away from her walking to the kitchen.
Trying to keep her away from the kitchen I told her to wait for me in the living room because I wanted to talk to her about something. I didn't know what I would talk to her about but that was a problem for future me to resolve, somehow it worked.
“What's that sound?”
She called out to me while walking towards the living room couch. It took me a few seconds to come up with an excuse.
“I think it’s the sink, or the pipes at least”
I opened the door to the kitchen with my eyes closed at first hesitant to look knowing what would be greeting me. slowly prying my eyes open I started to see its outline, my muscles started to lose strength as the details of the man came into my view, I felt the grocery bags start to slip from my arms, my knees buckled, face first I fell onto the kitchen floor scattering the groceries all over the floor, I mixture of a light scream and a yelp escaped from my mouth as my body made contact with the floor, Emma concerned for my safety ran into the kitchen, she didn't scream, using all of the strength and mobility I had left in my muscles I rolled over expecting to see her face drenched in terror, her body frozen still unable to move just like my body had done the first time that I saw him, but Emma looked concerned, the man was gone, she crouched down beside me.
“Oh my god are you ok? What happened?”
I looked around observing my surroundings.
“I um… I… I tripped on the little thing at the bottom of the doorframe”
I finally managed to blurt out another excuse, not being able to remember what the name of a door sill was. I started to sit up using a part of the energy that had returned to my body, pain pulsed through my chest and arms, Emma looked at me with a concerned face.
“You've been acting really weird since I got home, are you sure you're ok?”
“Yeah… I think I’m just having one of those days you know”
The confusion on Emma’s face said that she didn’t know and to be honest I didn't either, I guess my luck of pulling random excuses out of my ass ran out, Emma thought that she triggered some sort of PTSD response after barging into the house unannounced at first apologizing then trying to change the subject to stop my trembling which I was still unsuccessfully trying to hide from her.
“Did you buy candles?”
Emma asked picking the groceries apart from the garbage that spilled out the can that the man had knocked over, placing them on the table next to the now half-empty glass jars, the flames flickered above the inch or so of molten wax the man was unable to finish drinking.
“Yeah I’ve been struggling with work lately, they usually help me focus”
“Huh Interesting combination you’ve got going on here”
She looked at me and smiled slightly, I smiled back and chuckled to seem normal.
“Yeah even I don't know what I was trying to accomplish here, to be honest”
I tried to help Emma clean up the spilled groceries but she did not let me, she told me that I needed to recover like I had been in a car crash instead of having taken a little tumble. After a few seconds of silence, Emma spoke again.
“Anyway, what did you want to talk to me about earlier?”
A quick jolt of stress shot through my body, in a jumbled mess of lies and fear I had forgotten what I had told Emma, I sat there in silence for a few seconds unable to come up with an excuse
“I…umm… I don’t remember, it wasn't anything serious though”
“Damn did you hit your head too?”
She said once again proudly smiling at her joke.
At this point Emma picked up the last bag of potato chips from the floor and placed it on the table, then she opened the fridge and started loading the groceries into it.
“Anyway I gotta go get back to work’’
I blurted out after a few more seconds of awkward silence.
“Alright well good luck”
I walked over into the living room and sat down in front of my workstation, which now consisted of a laptop sitting on a small foldable TV tray that had just barely enough room left on it to fit a small USB mouse.
The last thing I remember, before I fell asleep, was me mindlessly scrolling through apartment listings while Emma watched a random 90’s horror movie I’m positive only had a budget of $500.
I woke up with a light stinging pain shooting through my dry throat, and a dim hissing sound caused by thousands of water drops striking the ground outside filled the room. I pressed the spacebar on my laptop, the brightness of the screen blinding me temporarily, after taking a few seconds to let my eyes readjust I managed to make out the time, 3:45 AM. A strong smell I was unable to make out the origin of assaulted my nostrils. Lavender.
The smell hitting my nose had the same effect on me that I would expect smelling salts would have on a weightlifter right before they set a world record. Before I knew it my legs were moving on their own at an almost uncontrollable pace, fighting back against my mind which was telling them to slow down after years of being used to navigating both mine and Emma’s apartment as steadily as possible to not bother the neighbors.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity I stood before Emma’s bedroom door, a faint, yellow, pulsating light radiated from a lamp and snuck out of a small gap between the door and the doorframe, reluctantly I pushed my left hand up against the door, my right hand grasping onto the door frame for a sense of stability, once the door was fully agape I scanned the inside of the room my heart skipping a beat for every humanoid shadow cast up onto the wall by the lights from the wicks which were set ablaze and were being slowly burnt away.
I walked into Emma’s room and made my way over to her bedside table to put out the candle, as I stepped closer towards her, her face became more defined, I could finally make out her features, she was awake, but no she could not have been, even though her eyes were wide open they never blinked, she didn't even move slightly, as I moved closer I finally managed to fully make out the expression of pure terror on her face, her mouth wide agape as if she was about to release a deafening screach, but she could not have, a single drop of solidified wax dribbled out of the corner of her mouth and clung to her cheek, my eyes traced the cream colored path back towards her mouth, first up her cheek then between the corner of her mouth and finally behind her teeth, there instead of her tongue or the roof of her mouth I saw a wall of wax which had filled in the entirety of her mouth.
I fell to my knees and hunched forward supporting my body weight with my arms, I was too late, I resisted the urge to vomit and got back up onto my feet, a mixture of tears and snot slid down my face and onto my lips, shaking now I slowly started limping over towards my phone which I had left on the couch next to where I had awoken just minutes before, just minutes before my life was destroyed because of my lies if I had just told Emma what I had gone through, if I had just told her what had happened on the night of the incident which now seemed trivial, even if she thought that I was crazy, I know that she would have complied just to make me feel comfortable.
It took me at least 30 seconds of repeated attempts to stabilize my hands enough to properly dial 911. “Someone broke into my apartment and hurt my friend” was the only reasonable explanation I could come up with that would not get the operator to hang up on me thinking that this was a prank call.
I sat there in the living room for an agonizing 10 minutes, crying, my sadness slowly transformed into anger towards myself, and my mind raced thinking of all the lies I’d told, I kept thinking that if I had just told her the truth she would not have been laying there in her bed, her body bloated, “every single orifice has signs of forced penetration and has been filled with what seems to be candle wax” is what was written on her autopsy report.
For a few days I was the main suspect in Emma’s murder, but due to the almost unstoppable crying and the unresponsive state that I was in when the police arrived, mixed with the lack of evidence of me having a way to produce 30 pounds of candle wax led to me being released out of police custody, but because I was the main suspect I was not told any details about what had fully happened to Emma, for days all I had to work off of was the image of her face frozen in terror, and a short glance I caught of her bloated body as she was being carted out on a stretcher.
I recounted every single word of our last conversations over and over again until they became permanently etched into my brain.
Emma’s parents originally wanted to cremate her, as that is what she had somewhat jokingly asked for whenever the topic of funerals came up, well she had joked about wanting to have had unpopped popcorn shoved down her throat before she was sent off to “scare the shit out of the guy cremating me” but due to all the wax which would have been impossible to get out of her body they were forced to bury her.
A few days before Emma’s funeral her body disappeared.
After Emma’s death, her parents took me into their home, after reading the autopsy reports and seeing her corpse they had thrown out every single candle they owned which made their home the safest choice I had, still, this did not stop me from buying a machete and keeping it under my bed, just in case.
I was laying on the bed in their guest bedroom The day that the police informed Emma’s parents about her disappearance, the bedroom is right above the front porch of the house, at first I heard them ring the doorbell which was followed up by 3 powerful knocks on the door, for about a minute I laid there on the bed listening to muffled voices exchanging distorted words I was barely able to make out which slowly transformed into distorted weeps, curious I lifted myself up from the bed, made my way over to the window and carefully lifted the bottom panel making Shure to not make too much noise, the distorted muffled sounds started forming into coherent words “We checked the security footage but the only strange thing we could see was a 5 second time jump” one of the officers spoke in a serious and almost monotone voice “which meant that the security guard who was the only person in the building had to climb down 2 flights of stairs walk through a 40 foot long hallway and then drag her body back up stairs and out of the building in 5 seconds” Emma’s mom let out yelp “ but don’t worry ma'am that’s actually good news because we know that her corpse is still somewhere within the building and was probably brought to the wrong floor by an intern, we’ve already warned all of the staff at the hospital to keep an eye out, and we also sent 5 officers to search the hospital”
I could not believe what I was hearing, my breathing quickened, but this time instead of fear I felt anger, that fucker stole her corpse and was probably in the weird separate plane of existence he always went back to after terrorizing me, cutting off chunks of her body, melting her, and drinking her.
I closed the window Emma’s mom's cries once again turned into a muffled rumble which was only possible to make out if you knew what to look for, I took a few steps back away from the window planning to lay back down, not wanting to bother Emma’s parents. I bumped into something, not something, someone, its fleshy towering form as solid as a wall sent me tumbling forward, I knew it was him, he had returned to take me too, to stretch his swollen cracked lips, push them down my esophagus, fill my lungs and stomach with wax. But despite all of that this time I was not scared, I was angry, and I was not going to stand there in terror like I had the last time I saw him.
I fell forward onto my knees my face missing the window sill just by mere inches, I put my hands onto the floor, lifted one of my knees, and rotated 180 degrees now facing the monster, to the right of him pushed up against the wall was the bed, light from the sun reflected off of the metallic button which kept my machete in it’s sheathe, the man started to stretch his lips, they were moving towards me, waving a wiggling through the air like a snake slithering towards me.
I dove towards the bed one of my feet pushing off of the floor and the other pushing against the wall which creaked under the pressure applied to it, I flew for a few moments before slamming down onto the carpet and sliding forward, the heat generated by my skin brushing against the carpet released a sharp stinging pain throughout my body, my outstretched arm landed just a few inches short of the machete, I quickly bent my arms, pushing my body up and crawled towards the machete. my fingers wrapped around the handle I spun around, my back pushed up against the bedside table, once again facing the man, he was still facing the window but his lips faced me and were just a few feet away from me, for what felt like minutes but was most likely no longer than a second, I struggled to hook my finger under the strap securing the machete into its sheath, as the lips inched towards me the man started producing gurgling noises, he was regurgitation wax.
I finally pulled the machete out of its sheath, I swung the blade at the man's lips, the blade was not met with any resistance as it sliced through the man’s lips which landed on the carpeted floor with an audible thud, the man did not have a physical reaction to my counter-attack, his lips kept creeping towards me, once again I slashed at the lips, still no reaction, I repeated this at least 3 more times.
I wanted to kill him, I wanted to take revenge for what he had done to Emma, but fighting back was pointless. I realized that no matter how much I tried to hurt it, I could not kill him, I could not get rid of him.
My rage dissipated and a mixture of fear and sadness crept in, and soon took over my body, I screamed for help, I screamed in fear, in agony, tears streamed down my face as the man's lips finally reached my face, he wasn’t met with any resistance as his lips snuck between mine, pried my jaw open and finally started to slide down my esophagus.
I heard the cops run up the stairs, they started banging on the door asking if I was okay only to have been met with muffled screams, hot wax started to pour down inside of me, the stinging pain of the heat made me want to plunge the machete which I had dropped onto the ground next to me into my stomach to create a gaping wound that the wax would hopefully funnel out of, the texture of the man's slippery, oily lips matched with the poison like flavor of the wax caused me to start gagging, I felt my insides bulging like at any moment my intestines would have been filled to the point where they would pop, I wanted to vomit, the drain myself of the filth I was filled with, but his lips had plugged my throat not allowing anything to get out.
Hearing my muffled screams the cops started kicking the door down, the man retracted his lips, the suction aided my attempts at cleansing my insides, I got onto my hands and knees streams of molten wax pouring out of me, solidifying on the the carpet, with another loud thud the door swung open slamming into the wall, the man was gone.
That’s the last thing I remember before I passed out, but according to one of the doctors who was in the ambulance that brought me to the hospital, I was still semi-responsive during the first 10 minutes of the ride to the hospital.
Approximately 13.4 pounds of wax were removed from my body, the doctors said that I was in a critical condition and some of them did not expect me to make it.
One of the officers who was there the day the man attacked me took a report of what had happened to me, due to the unmistakable evidence of what had happened to both me and Emma, and the fact that this was the 3rd instance of me reporting something like this the police finally started investigating who this man might have been.
Around a month later I was discharged from the hospital and once again have been staying in the living room of Emma’s parent's house.
I’ve been seeing the man again, candles were not allowed in the hospital I stayed at, which means that he’s probably very hungry, he’s close to attacking me again, I know it, he wants to finish what he started and I don't know if I have the power to fight back, I’m not sure if defeating him is even possible, I’m tired.
I’ve been seeing Emma too, her bloated, reanimated corpse often appears to be standing next to the man. If I let him take me will I get to join them? I’ve tried asking but they don’t answer, they just stare, I can’t keep living in constant fear, always looking over my shoulder, I miss Emma.
submitted by wood_chomper to nosleep [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 01:27 Next_Requirement_656 FTM exhausted and lost

I guess I’m here to vent and share my story with others who get it.. because it’s hard for me to talk about with family or friends because no one understands and explaining things over and over just feels like losing more energy honestly. I’m welcoming all suggestions since you have been through it.
My baby is 16 weeks and has not had a “good day” since he’s been born. Over 100 days fighting for him and watching him struggle. We tried breastmilk, multiple formulas, and settled on Neocate syneo almost 3 months ago which cleared up a few of his more scary symptoms, but he still has most of them. So many visits doctors have told me his symptoms are normal, but didn’t take the time to really listen or watch what has been going on with him, which makes me feel like I’m being a overprotective mom, or that I’m crazy losing my mind, but things are clearly not right. Finally his ped sees that he’s truly struggling and sent a referral for GI since she had no knowledge on cmpa or what to do for him next and she said “I thought he would have outgrown it by now and the Pepcid isn’t helping” I have wanted to cry and scream at her at the same time because I feel like she truly neglected my baby while I have watched him suffer😢
He was unsettled since birth.. he was ready to eat right away, but struggled so much. We tried breastmilk, Bobbie, gentle ease, nutramigen, and Neocate syneo. Pepcid, increase dosage Pepcid, increase frequency Pepcid, gas drops, gripe water, changing bottles, probiotics, changing nipple flow, keeping upright. Literally everything.
I’m so lost and it hurts to watch my baby suffer.
Current symptoms: GI discomfort - Eating every 2-4 hours besides at night, 45 minutes up to 2 hours to eat 4oz.
Throwing up projectile. Coughing then forcefully vomit half or whole bottle.
Spit up constantly.
Arching back in pain when feeding and after screaming so loud.
Poop so very loose and mucousy since birth, and worsening over time. Yellow liquid or dark green with black streaks or green with yellow seeds. Has never been formed. Horrible sour smell like vinegar or rotten eggs. Clearly in pain when pushing or when he is struggling to go. Either can barely poop once a day or will go 5x a day.
He was eating 5-6 oz, eating less oz now 3-4 still taking an hour and screaming when seeing bottle close to him. Screaming when getting into feeding position.
Hard to settle and screaming loud until passing out. Not full enough to sleep long periods.
It’s been 2 weeks since increasing Pepcid but on it for 12 weeks and 12 weeks on amino acid formula - Neocate syneo.
Have to distract to eat - change position, sing, shh, takes 45-60+ minutes Unlatches quickly Crying in feeding position Arching back fussy
Since birth not 1 good happy feed without crying or pain. Has lessened over time but getting worse again
First 2 months couldn’t be put down, tummy time, bath, diaper, sleep unless held without absolutely screaming and losing it - sometimes these days can lay flat. First month awake 2-3 hours sleep 30 minutes
I was giving a time to see if it would get better, but it’s not getting better and some situations are getting worse. The things that have gotten better are not having an immediate reaction when eating - he had swollen eyelids, severe immediate rash and lingering eczema, and difficulty breathing. He will sleep now without being held. I’m thankful for the improvements, but I’m so heartbroken that things are not getting “normal” for him. It seemed like the Neocate syneo would be good for him but he’s not good.
It just seems like nothing is helping and it’s all trial and error. My baby is almost 4 months and it’s been a painful blur.
The “solutions” I have come up with through research - changing to Prevacid or Prilosec for the reflux. Changing to alfamino (but super scared since it has soy oil) since it doesn’t have coconut, or switching to rtf alitenium (but super scared since it has milk), or trying regular Neocate since some babies struggle with the pro/prebiotics in the syneo.. which feels like the safest option since he had such trouble with milk and soy. Or the fear of something else being completely wrong and causing his pain and mucous. I just feel defeated with how things are going. But also so scared to change things again.
submitted by Next_Requirement_656 to MSPI [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 22:46 SamMorrisHorror Them Devils Part 2

Scott Masterson had first met Scarlett at a rooftop party in downtown Dallas. Their age and the time of year were both in late springtime, them in their mid twenties and the date in early May. He had on a sharp yet breezy blazer and she astonished in a thigh length sleeveless blue dress.
“Oh hey Scott I don’t believe you two have met…” his then happily married friend had remarked with a slow swinging open hand toward her.
“Scott Masterson…reluctant friend to this knucklehead” he said with a tight lipped grin, trying not to be so obvious with his instant rapture.
“Scarlett…a pleasure…”
Her hand was so delicate to Scott’s touch. They locked eyes. It was like looking back through centuries of connection, endless days of laying in the sun next to the Seine River, or rising to Hollywood fame in the 1940’s and only having each other who would understand the glory and the pain of it all, or generations of quiet, simple country love that would bear such beautiful, happy children that would go on to raise beautiful, happy children, all with their dark blue eyes. Yes, the memories of every love story since the beginning of time was swirling right there in Scarlett’s irises. Scott had to catch himself before he stared embarrassingly too long.
“Sorry Scottie here doesn’t get out often” his friend quipped, which Scott appreciated actually, it helped him snap back to professionalism.
“Well I don’t either…at least I prefer not to.” Scarlett’s words flowed through the air like a flock of rose petals.
“Hey, kindred spirits.” Scott was really sensing a rising energy out of her, they had barely broken eye contact.
“Well, I’ll let you two have at it, I got a wife around here somewhere. Hey…Scott and Scarlett…not bad, not bad.” His friend exited stage right with a sly chuckle.
“Nice guy…so…what are you drinking, Scarlett?” Scott looked around for the emptiest corner of the rooftop bar, hoping to find a nice place for them to be able to hear each other. This night had just become something.
“That depends, Scott…what do you like?”
Oh man.
Well, as you can expect, the evening blossomed into a beautiful, long winded conversation that etched a long list of similarities between the two. They both lived in the city, had never married, and had dreamed of stable, simpler lives far away from tall buildings and busy streets. The next morning Scott awoke in her arms, which warmed much deeper than just his skin. He could feel her soothing his very identity, his future, everything. Her arms were tailor made to fit his very soul, and he had never felt more safe and at home.
“Mmm…you can stay right here…” she whispered, eyes still closed.
“I will…I will”
They both fell back asleep, into a dream that wouldn’t end upon waking.
Two years passed and suddenly they lived that simple backwoods life, way out where acres of land far out-populated the few and far between people. They took a lovely home, which happily looked over a long backyard, right up to a lively yet mostly undisturbed river. Their only neighbor within a mile was an older ranch worker named Charles, who rarely made himself perceivable. Days were spent way on into town where they both had offices. They didn’t mind the commute. Nights were spent mostly like this night, cuddled outside near a lovely little fire, with a slowly shrinking amount of wine sitting between them. Enjoying their Kingdom. Tonight, however, would prove to be a special night, for many reasons, all unexpected.
“Honey, I’ve been thinking…” Scott began, sitting up and opening his hands to the warmth of the fire.
“Oh?” Scarlett also sat up, eyes widening.
“So look, Scarlett, the last two years have been the best of my life. An absolute dream…”
She held her breath, her focus darting between his eyes and mouth.
“Yeah?”
“We have everything we ever want out here. But…what if there’s more?”
“More?” She had envisioned this very conversation hundreds of times.
“Our dreams have come true, but what if we…made some new dreams?” Scott turned and embedded his eyes into hers. He burst into a big smile.
“Scott…I thought…”
“Nevermind what I said” he cut her off, which he always made a point to never do, but this was a good exception.
“I’m ready, Scarlett…let’s have a family.”
“Ohhhh Scott, oh Scott”
They hugged tight enough to where it hurt.
“Well, in that case, we may need to open another bottle.” She said playfully, bouncing her eyebrows twice.
“Excellent. I’ll be right up. I’ll put this fire out and then start yours up.”
“Oh stop!” She bounded away girlishly, up the snowy back steps and into the house.
Scott let out a big sigh that he could see in the cold air and sat back in his chair, taking in his decision. He really was ready. He had secretly been keeping a long list of names that he liked and that he thought would work in front of Masterson. Especially little girl names. He stared into the campfire flames, getting lost imagining the three of them sitting right here, a little girl resting securely in Scarlett’s arms, as Scott had found himself, and stayed within these past two years.
Suddenly his trance was broken when, from the road in front of their house, came the sound of a vehicle approaching at high speed. Scott snapped his head back toward the house to get a better listen. He could see, around the house and through the trees, a large truck barreling down the country road, its headlights racing and bouncing with intensity. In an instant, it had passed up the road and out of sight.
“Huh?”
Soon, after a moment of silence, another sound echoed into the night. This sound rattled Scott to the bone and tore all that was right in his world into pieces. A sharp, bellowing squeal. His eyes shot over to his neighbors house, which was about a tenth of a mile to his right but still had a couple dim lights on that he could see. The shriek seemed to come from there.
Then, more squeals. It was hellish. More than animal but not quite human. Scott stood up. He heard crashing and tearing and further destruction coming from Charles’ house.
“Scarlett!! Scarlett!” He yelled toward his house, where he looked and could see her silhouette behind the curtains at the kitchen window. She didn’t seem to hear him.
He turned back toward his neighbors. The chaos had gone quiet. Not a half a moment after, though, he heard something big barreling through the trees as fast as that truck had been sprinting. Running, running furiously between the two houses. Searching, hunting. Scott was taken aback so hard that his heel had caught the edge of the fire pit, throwing him down only inches away from severe burns. He had knocked his head in the whiplash, making him groan and take a moment to regain his bearings.
“SCARLETT!!!!”
He screamed out toward his home as he sat up, rubbing a quickly rising bump on the back of his head. He heard a loud breaching on the side of his house. The patio door. No. No. Then, all hell broke loose. Scarlett started wailing and crying and he could hear crashes of plates and glasses and deep guttural roars coming from the kitchen inside. Shadows danced in a frenzy from the curtained windows. Sounds of instinctual survival seemed to be thrown from Scarlett inside. Sounds of defeat. Sounds of agony. Sounds of insanity. Scott sprang to his feet, his equilibrium being more damaged than he realized after his fall. He had to catch his hand on a chair to stabilize himself. Scarlett’s symphony of pain had gone quiet. Soon after something burst back out the patio door again and off in the same direction as that truck before.
Scott struggled back up to the house, slowly climbing the wintered, crunching stairs that led to the patio. He no longer yelled for Scarlett. In fact, the only thing that came to his senses was the sound of his own heavy breathing. Everything else had been turned off, save for a heavy and sudden dread that he had prayed he would never feel. He came to the side of his house where indeed the patio door had been busted and forced open. It laid inside the kitchen, its hinges snapped like toothpicks. Scott, with eyes wide and twitching, slowly entered his home and looked into the kitchen.
He didn’t scream. He didn’t even change his breathing. He didn’t blink. He just got a good long look at what laid before him.
Everything was broken. The fridge was on its side, the door hanging open and food and drink scattered all over the floor. The table was upended, its legs to the ceiling. A chair was resting on the counter, possibly having been thrown in defense. And Scarlett. Oh Scarlett. She…was…everywhere. She was all over the floor. She was sprayed against the walls. She was stuck to the window. She was in the sink.
Scott gently walked through the carnal mess and sabotage of his world. Long ago he had known exactly what he would do if something anywhere near this bad were to happen to him. He politely stumbled through the kitchen, down the hall, and into the bedroom. He opened his closet door and lowered a fire safe from the top rack. He unlocked it with a passcode. 511, after that warm May date when he had first met Scarlett. In the safe was a Sig Sauer P320 handgun. Scott took it out, along with a box of bullets, loaded one into the gun, put the safe back on its rack, and walked out of the closet, sitting on his bed. Their bed. Where they should’ve been laying right at this very moment, working toward a happy future. Where he would’ve kissed her forehead and put a hand on her growing midsection. Where they would have awoken on Christmas morning to the sound of children who were way too excited to remain asleep. Where they would’ve grown old. Where they would’ve smiled at each other through wrinkles, satisfied with all the love they shared and passed on to the next generations. Where they would’ve held each other in deep peace as they finally fell asleep to this world.
“I will…I will”
In one quick motion Scott pulled back the hammer and stuck the barrel of that pistol right up against his Governor and blew himself away, far away, right back into Scarlett’s loving arms.
Jeremy “Smallmouth” Bassett quickly yet stealthily made his way back to his Uncle’s house. He hugged the sides of the dark country road, keeping his eyes and ears wide open as to notice any sounds pertaining to the event that he had just witnessed there in the field next to the huge blaze. His only thought was Uncle Chuck. His house was right on the warpath of that horrible thing and Smallmouth had to go to him and make sure he was safe. He dared not go back to his truck, which would bring a lot of unwanted attention. No, Smallmouth walked and walked and finally saw the lights of his Uncle’s house. He carefully approached the front door from the shadowed driveway. Suddenly it occurred to Smallmouth that something was very wrong here. The door was busted in, having been plowed through by something very large and very strong.
“No…no…no”
Smallmouth slowly entered the house. The kitchen and living room were a disaster, chairs and tables and bottles strewn about and shattered. Bloody hoof-prints covered the floors, each of them the size of dinner plates. Smallmouth heard no noise. He felt himself well with tears, his nose a faucet that he began to sniff up as he worked his way through to his Uncle’s room, the door there also being broken in. A small whine growing in his throat, Smallmouth peaked into his uncles bedroom.
It was all in tatters. The bed had been attacked and shredded, the mattress being ripped up and thrown about as if it were made of cotton candy. More bloody hoof-prints were painted all over the brown carpet. Smallmouth trembled and put a hand up to his wet face. He didn’t see a way that his Uncle was anywhere near alive, knowing what he knew about the monster that had been in this house.
Smallmouth slowly walked to the living room, to the only little table that had been untouched in the attack. It was almost as if the bottle of whiskey teleported into his hand from the overturned cabinet, unopened. He fixed that real quick.
Soon he was several pulls deep of the only thing in the world that he knew would make him feel better, even if only for a few hours. He found his pack of cigarettes in his coat pocket and lit one up, although he was indoors. What did it matter? He sat in a chair that he had turned right side up and set the bottle on the table and looked out the back window into the pitch black. He cried for his Uncle and he cried for the world. He cried for himself. He cried for broken promises and his own weakness. He drank and drank until his vision shook from right to left everywhere he looked. At first he didn’t even notice the figures on the back porch. Then his vibrating focus did pick up on them, but by then it was too late. It was so dark out there but in their outlines he could see they wore long robes and hoods.
“HA!! COME AND GET ME! HAHA!! YOU COME AND YOU GET ME!!” Smallmouth boasted with a delusional amount of courage.
A creak escaped from the kitchen and he drunkenly slung his head over toward it. Three more figures stood there. Or was it just one? Smallmouth was none the wiser. All at once the hooded intruders from both inside and outside began to chant a strange, twisted rhyme in strikingly low and dissonant harmony:
“A sliver…of liver…goes down…with a shiver… …and gives…your gullet…to gall… …but drink…the Cider…that drowns…the Spider… …and you…will be free…of it all… …so tighten the grip…that loosens your lips… …O raise…the bottle…of brown… …and wake tomorrow…to find…in sorrow… …ANOTHER…SPIDER…TO…DROWN”
Smallmouth groaned at them in dissatisfaction and turned his bottle up again and began to chug the whiskey. As he did they repeated the chant except this time it was louder and closer. By the time Smallmouth had finished his bottle he was quickly losing consciousness. This wasn’t just whiskey. As he closed his eyes he felt hands grabbing him from all sides.
Smallmouth pulled open his sticky eyelids. His head felt like someone had bowled a strike into it. Wind froze his face. The smell of sickly, wet iron stung his nostrils. His vantage was higher than usual. Way higher. He was looking out into another field, but from easily ten feet up. He saw an old church, formerly painted white but now a flaky pale-beige. He heard the friction of a quick pull of rope below him, matched with a slight, tight pain at his feet. He looked down. A red-robed figure was fastening him against a wooden structure of some kind. His feet sat on a small flat platform perpendicular to a post that went from the ground up past smallmouths head. He couldn’t move his arms, so he quickly shot his eyes side to side. They were also tied to another horizontal post. A cross. He was being tied to a crude wooden cross. His shirt had been removed, exposing a hairy, overweight belly. Smallmouth tried to speak, but all that came out was a slow, unintelligible grumble. He was still drunk. No, this was more than that. He was under the influence of something strong and absolutely inhibitive. He wallowed again, and took in a deep breath. The smell of iron once again hit his nose. He looked down at himself. He was covered in a thick, red liquid. That wasn’t just the smell of iron. He had been splashed full body with blood.
“Now now, young servant…” the figure at his feet had finished his task and took a couple of steps out to admire his own handiwork.
“Ahh…perfect. The picture of martyrdom. Yes, you will always be remembered, Brother Bassett. You are to be the first Saint of The New Bible.” He opened his arms in his declaration.
Smallmouth looked up into the cold night sky. The moon shown down, giving everything a midnight spotlight. It was a gorgeous waxing gibbous, big and bright but not quite full. Yes, he was in a great big snowy field that housed an old worn down church. From the windows of the church he saw candles glowing, showing dark heads and shoulders looking out to him, also covered in loose hoods, hiding faces. He was hanging on a cross about one hundred feet from the old church. In front of the cross was a partially covered pit, a couple of two by fours supporting double armfuls of branches and dead leaves.
The figure at the base of the cross put his arms back to his side. He was still looking right at the drugged Smallmouth’s dumbstruck face. Even with a veiled mouth you could hear the twisted smile in his voice.
“Tonight you will help us finally defeat this legion, Smallmouth. You see, it may have the evil spirits within it, but at its core, it is still an owned animal. An animal that knows its Master very well. An animal that will remember the smell of its Master. You, my friend, are covered in its Master right now. And you are hanging on a cross, the symbol of this brute’s most hated enemy. But take heart, young Brother. Before you is our pit of spears. Yes you will attract the beast, but our Divine plan will intercept it and the beast will fall and be pierced. And then, oh dear brother, you will forever be immortalized. You will be purified in fire by the hands of your church brethren. Out of your screams and into the smoke the iniquities of all will be released. We will go on to preach your good example and your sainthood forever and ever.”
Smallmouth began to drool and hum pathetically. He could hear and understand the words of the robed man but he couldn’t fight back. His body was useless, limp inside its rope confines. All he could do now is think, and watch, and wait, and dread his fate.
The figure turned away from him, walking over near the pit and gathering up a bundle of brambles and throwing them over the last open area, covering it completely. He then crunched through the snow over to the front door of the old church, groaning open the door. He stood at the dark doorway for a few seconds in silence, and then began to make a noise. An over exaggerated pig squealing noise, high pitched and infuriating. Soon after other voices from inside the church began to do the same, their wailing echoing out of the building and all across the field, loudly signaling, calling out. It may as well have been a dinner bell. Not a half minute after they began the distress signal it was loudly answered by a distant squall. A furious squall.
This was it. Either way it happened Smallmouth was about to die. Experience terror, and then die, and not even have the ability to put up any kind of defense. It wasn’t fair. He just slowly lifted up his head and watched out far into the moonlit, white field. He then raised his heavy head further and took a good gander at the moon and stars for the last time.
“God,” he thought to himself, still having full inner monologue yet no outer motor function, “I am so sorry. I am so sorry for being what I am. I am so sorry for ending up in this place. It’s only my own fault. If it wasn’t for me being so stupid and messy and drunk and terrible then this wouldnt be happening to me.”
He began to shed tears that washed lines into the blood on his face.
“Please forgive me God. Please, please, please forgive me for all of my sins. This is it. I’m gonna die. I’m gonna die. PLEASE FORGIVE ME!!!!” He yelled inside his own mind, hoping and trying to send his silent words as far up into heaven as they could go.
He lowered his eyes back to the ground. He looked over at the church again. The windows were empty, the candles were extinguished. Those hooded cowards were hiding from their own handmade sacrificial service. All was quiet for a long pause until a much louder, closer bleating began at the edge of the forest not even three hundred feet away from Smallmouth’s glazed over eyes. It was time, and it was too late for a miracle.
Out of the woods, slowly and heavily, stomped the massive hog. As it marched closer and closer Smallmouth could see its white, boiled over eyes and black-burnt skin. Its jaws were flying open and snapping its sharp, pocket knife-sized teeth together in an intimidating “clack”. It was now less than a hundred feet away, the dark old church to its right shoulder. It stopped, its pale glowing eyes fixed right on Smallmouth on the crude cross. It truly was a monster. It stood as tall as a man and as long as a canoe. Around its murderous mouth were stains of red, the remnants of all that it had taken from the world on this unholy night. In its clanging jaws were bits of flesh. It snorted and scowled.
Then, in a fury, it wailed that horrible squeal and started off into a dead sprint. It galloped and galloped toward Smallmouth at a high, blistering speed. It kept yawping and howling as it cut the distance from the cross down to fifty feet, forty feet, thirty, twenty. All at once it passed over the covered pit and plunged in. In his doomed, dead eyed stupor Smallmouth could hear what sounded like paint being dumped from a rooftop onto concrete. Trails of black liquid squirted and splashed up from the pit, which had been uncovered in the fall of the beast. Unbelieving, Smallmouth saw dozens of steel spear tips standing up from the dug-in ground. Right in the middle of them the beast was stuck. The sheer weight of the animal had caused the spears to pierce through its tough skin, sticking out of its back, soaked in black blood. One spear had stabbed right under the hogs chin, passing up through its jaws and out its black snout. It made agonized sounds. It roared and roared and shook the spears inside it, beginning furiously, then growing weaker and weaker within seconds. Finally, it let out one last weak little squeal, before it went still and quiet.
Smallmouth was frozen both physically by drugs and constraints and mentally by shock. His mouth hung open toward the pit of spears, his vision blurry. He took in a deep, troubled breath and let out a moan of disbelief and relief. The old church doors sprang open, and the sound of jubilation within flowed out into the night. The red robed figures flocked out of the building toward the pit, arms raised in celebration. They surrounded the hole, getting a good look at their success and their enemies defeat. Some held additional spears and began further stabbing the dead animal, causing more black blood to be shed up at them. They all yelled loudly and triumphantly. Some danced around the pit. Some skipped over to Smallmouth on the cross and danced around him, slapping his legs and spinning in circles.
Smallmouth looked on at the raucous celebration, both in utter disbelief of their trap actually working and also in turmoil. How long now until they fully execute their plan.
A taller robed man, whose voice matched the same one who spoke to Smallmouth as he tied his feet, spoke up, sounding almost happily intoxicated.
“Ahh yes my Brothers!! It is done!! We have won!!!”
They all whooped and cheered.
“Brother Norman, go into the church and bring me the small tank of fuel. Let us send our dear Saint Bassett to the Holy lands, where he will be adored for all eternity!”
They all clapped and hollered. One figure began childishly skipping away from the pit and over toward the front door of the church.
Then, it happened.
From the pit all of a sudden a great blaze erupted instantly. It stood as tall as the cross, and it burned a furious red and blue. It raged and raged, blinding Smallmouth and making him clumsily turn his face away from the heat.
All of the figures panicked, screaming and scattering away toward the church. They didn’t get far. Up from the fiery pit, dozens of long, long, black arms, adorned with six hooking claws emerged and stretched out of the flames and latched on to the legs of those trying to escape. Smallmouth heard crying and wailing from the men as the black, razor clawed-hands of the legion grabbed them and began pulling them back, into the blazes. One by one the red robed people were dragged into the flames, their clothes catching instantly. Smallmouth could see violently shaking bodies in the evil furnace. Oh, the screams. Above the tortured howling, the sound of laughing broke out. Deep, menacing laughter, hundreds of voices, echoed up into the air from the burning hole. Then, in one extinguishing squeeze, the ground swallowed the entirety of the fiery pit, leaving it completely covered in dirt, still and quiet. Soon after, and just like the pit of spears, the old church building caught in an instant and raging fire, quickly toppling the walls and dropping the steeple into its ruins. The smoke towered high in the night sky, which had just began to hint at a pale morning blue. Smallmouth hung on his cross in utter horror and surprise.
As the late evening hours glowed into early morning the smoke eventually tapered off, as Smallmouth’s drugs finally began to wear off as well. The fires of the church did garner long distance attention, though. Just as Smallmouth was able to regain control of his muscles and voice he heard emergency sirens call out into the cold morning air. Not long after, two fire trucks, an ambulance and a sheriffs truck tore into the field and toward Smallmouth on the cross. Not long after Smallmouth could feel the tied ropes being cut loose by firemen, their uniforms easily the best red clothes he had seen all night.
“What on God’s green Earth happened here son?” A bearded man with a dark hat and brown shirt and pants asked Smallmouth once he had been lowered down from the cross and sat on the ground with a shock blanket around his shoulders. The Sheriff, no doubt.
“God’s green Earth. It really is God’s, isn’t it?” Smallmouth whispered, staring out across the cold field. Then, at the very place he was staring, an old, familiar truck came barreling out of the gravel road in the woods and through the field in the steadily growing morning light. It was Uncle Chuck’s truck. It hurried over toward the other emergency vehicles, parked, the driver’s side door burst open, and Uncle Chuck came bounding out over to Smallmouth, his eyes wide and his mouth a wonderfully shocked “O”.
“JEREMY! JEREMY!!!” He basically fell on Smallmouth in a tight, warm hug. Smallmouth was caught off guard by Chuck using his real name.
His Uncle held him for several seconds and then let up, but kept his hands on Smallmouth’s shoulders.
“I thought you were dead.” Both of them said at almost the exact same time.
“I came back and your house was a mess and there was blood everywhere. I thought you were dead.” Smallmouth weakly spat out.
“Well, I woke up and you were gone, son, so I walked to the ranch to get my truck. I was worried bout ya son. I came back home and the whole place had been turned upside down. Blood on the carpet. I just thought the worst. Then I tried my neighbors house. Buddy, they’re dead. Looks like some wacko murder-suicide if I ever saw one. Scott probably tried to come kill us too and wrecked the place when he found it empty. I don’t know. But what I DO know is that you are right here! You are okay Jeremy!! Ahhh Praise Jesus!!”
“It’s not that, Uncle. That isn’t what happened out here. It’s..it was a..a, uh…”
Smallmouth’s fried brain couldn’t even comprehend what he had witnessed over the past few hours. It was all a violent blur.
“Dont worry bout it son, you can tell me everything on the way to the hospital. We gotta go get you checked out and cleaned up. C’mon.” He helped Smallmouth up and they walked over to the ambulance, his Uncle’s arm thrown around his shoulder.
Smallmouth would be sent home later that afternoon. It would take him and his Uncle a long time to sort through the chaos of that deadly night and rebuild their lives. But life kept on. Smallmouth would remain living with his Uncle, and would begin a job working with him down at the ranch. Together they started to attend a local church. Smallmouth never touched a drink or a drug or even a cigarette ever again, and remained steadfast in his newly revitalized faith.
submitted by SamMorrisHorror to TheCrypticCompendium [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 19:56 Far_Dig_6120 Blepharoplasty for almost 4 weeks and still very swollen!

I had an Asian blepharoplasty for almost 4 weeks and my eyes are still swollen a lot.
Currently I am taking Katrypsin to tone the swollen down and had stop applying heat for 2 days because my eyes got puffier after the heat sessions (the heat are not hot enough that it would burn my eyelids).
I am also using Polysiloxanes to stop the scarring (adviced and given by the surgeon). Though my eyes were already swollen before I started using it so I'm thinking it's not the reason.
Did anybody have similar experience, how do you deal with it?
submitted by Far_Dig_6120 to PlasticSurgery [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 04:36 Either_Journalist766 Son getting hurt at daycare

Son turned 3.5 yrs and has a bunch of buddies at his daycare. Has been going to this daycare since 2 yrs. His best friend does get very physical - pulls him around and seen scratches on his hands, catches him by his collar, chases him to the point where I've seen my son jump off the slide. I've actually seen that kid hit my son on several occasions.
From the last 3 weeks : 1. Bite on hand with wounds 2. Nail scratch on face and eyelid 3. Scratch on hand twice 4. Light green bruise on legs which is swollen and he says it pains
I have gotten no incident reports for any of these. Should I be reporting to the director? I have mentioned this to his class teacher after incident #3 but haven't gotten any action plan as such.
Any tips or suggestion would be greatly appreciated
submitted by Either_Journalist766 to Preschoolers [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 03:24 Novel_Nectarine8220 Do I have a bad case of dry eyes or something else?

I was diagnosed with dry eyes about 2 years ago. The episode I had at that time consisted of lots of redness and itchiness that was treated with frequent artificial tear use (Refresh Plus PF).
About a month ago, I had a week straight of ocular migraines. I wondered if it might be eye dryness causing it, so I started to up my artificial tear use. The migraines went away but I found myself with the driest eyes of my life. They feel like sandpaper and burn and my regular artificial tears did absolutely nothing and left me feeling worse in fact. Computer use definitely seems to make it worse.
The funny thing is that I have no eye redness this time around. I have been doing warm compresses with a microwave mask for a week now and gentle eye massages. I also started using Refresh celluvisc 2 days ago. It’s probably too soon to expect improvement, but they have not helped. They actually make my eyes a bit red in the short term.
I am trying to figure out if this is dry eyes or blepharitis or both. My eyelids don’t really feel itchy per say. I do wake up with swollen eyelids and don’t feel any better in the morning. My eyes themselves feel swollen almost? Like it’s hard to keep my eyes closed at night when trying to sleep. I did try shampooing my eyelids with baby shampoo for a few days but my eyes felt drier after and didn’t recover well. So I was nervous to continue
If it is dry eyes, any idea what the cause is and what else I can do? I have an appointment with an ophthalmologist but it isn’t for another few weeks.
Any and all help is much appreciated.
submitted by Novel_Nectarine8220 to Dryeyes [link] [comments]

2024.05.17 17:54 fallen_angel1201 Lash query.....

Hi, I started getting lash extensions firstly about 1-1 n a half years ago, got them for months and months every 2 weeks with no issues at all with the same lash tech too and loved them so much (I'm now 48 and that was my first ever time getting them in my life!!) Anyway, one time I went back as normal for my infill and practically right after I left one of my eyes was a little itchy/watery but I didn't think anything of it at first until basically the itching was getting so bad and it was a little painful, I felt it at first if I remember right, just at the corner if my eye and eventually it was my eyelid but I was clueless and didn't think it was serious or anything to worry about (I think I was just getting so annoyed cause I couldn't scratch the itch as I didn't want to waste my new lashes!! 🙈)
However that night I couldn't sleep properly due to it being so so itchy and painful and I was literally in tears, when I woke the next morning my full eyelid was swollen and red and my eye was watering like mad...if I remember right it was still the one eye or either that my other eye was a little itchy but nothing compared too the one that was swollen, it was that bad I called the doctor but was told it would be the optician I'd need to call, luckily they saw me within the hour and the second he looked at it he said it was an allergic reaction I'd taken, probably too the lash glue and gave me 2 sets of eyedrops and I think a cream but I was so confused cause like I said it was the same lash tech I'd been going too the entire time with no issues! Obviously I let her know and she got me up right away to take the lashes back off, she said she hadn't changed the glue she used and she genuinely felt so bad for me, gave me my money back even though I told her I didn't want it cause she still spent all that time putting them on....anyway sorry this is as long, long story short the reaction cleared up with the lashes removed and eye drops but it was a painful process with the constant itching but I stopped getting them after that until last year some time when it had been many months since I'd had them when I decide to try them again and went to a new person (the other one had stopped doing them) and near enough right away all the same symptoms came back! This time though the tech was so nasty to me so I had to take the lashes off myself with cotton wool soaked in olive oil....then I did some research online and a lot was saying once you take a reaction it will always happen so I was gutted about that but then I read in a few other places people can still get them but using sensitive lash glue for allergy sufferers so I bought 'noble sensitive lash glue' just about 1 month ago and my daughter has just done her lash course so I told her she could practice on me but she couldn't even get the glue out, it was mega thick she said, I ended up saying awk just use normal glue.....yip you guessed it, I took a reaction 😭 so basically I'm wondering if there are any lash techs who can advise me if this will always happen even if I do get another sensitive glue or if there is another glue I could try as I absolutely love when I have lashes on, I have really bad hooded eyelids & very fair lashes and they just make me feel nice.....I can't believe how long this is and if you get to the end thank you SO much......and please help if you can, TIA xx
submitted by fallen_angel1201 to eyelashextensions [link] [comments]

2024.05.16 01:10 phjobnowpls Allergic reaction to Sutab?

Hey everyone! Sorry if this is the wrong place, but I recently had a very strange experience with sutab bowel prep, and felt I may find a larger group on this subreddit to ask about similar experiences than the colonoscopy reddit.
Essentially, I was NKA until I took sutab in preparation for my first colonoscopy. Twenty minutes after starting the prep I experienced a severe allergic reaction (fortunately without anaphylaxis). My throat became incredibly itchy, then the rest of my body. I also developed hives, and my face and eyelids became swollen. Ultimately, I had to visit the ER and cancel my scope. The active ingredients in the drug are supposedly only naturally occurring electrolytes, so my doctors are a little stumped on how this happened. I did a quick google search but couldn't find much; only a post on the colonoscopy subreddit from very recently reporting a similar situation.
Anyways, has anyone on this sub had an allergic reaction to sutab? If so, do you have any other allergies? Or did you figure out what caused it? And when did it happen (I'm not convinced the other post I mentioned was a coincidence; could be a bad lot)?
Thanks for all your help! <3
submitted by phjobnowpls to ibs [link] [comments]

2024.05.15 23:33 wildly_domestic Does anyone consider their symptoms mild to what they read on this subreddit?

Basically, the title. I was diagnosed in 2018 with an autoimmune disease based on blood markers but my rheumatologist couldn’t tell me exactly which one I had. He said there were some markers for Lupus but not enough to diagnose me.
I can always tell when I’m having a flare because I get these sores in my mouth. They’re ulcers. They’re so insanely painful. When my stress was at its worst in my life, I was also getting these ulcers in my nose and I got one in my eye right under my eyelid. It was unimaginably painful and I went to my primary care physician to have it looked at when it happened. But she said she couldn’t see anything and basically seemed to imply I was over exaggerating, which honestly deterred me from continuing to see a doctor about these issues. I figured I had HSV 1 and it was particularly bad because I was so stressed.
I have had a myriad of other symptoms. Swollen joints, osteoarthritis, constant headaches, bleeding from random organs (ie. coughing up blood clots, constantly having blood in urine tests despite no infection, bleeding a lot when I pass stool). I have a lot of skin problem. I get those pimple blister things and am super sensitive to sunlight.
I’ve been having a flare recently, likely due to poor sleep and stress and I have gotten these terrible sores in my mouth again. So freaking painful. They were healing up after I slept a lot and then a few days later some new ones started popping. It was bothering me so much I googled mouth sores related to autoimmune diseases and found a description of Behçets. This is the first time I’ve ever found out about an autoimmune disease that seems to describe what I’ve been experiencing for so many years.
I found this sub and have been exploring it to see what the experiences of others are. And I feel like I have read some horror stories on here already. I know this place is not to be used for a diagnosis, and I already plan to have this conversation with my rheumatologist. I was just wondering if some people are just constantly uncomfortable and not always in searing pain?
I say this as I’m laying here with swollen muscles I am literally trying to tenderize like a steak because they’re so tense and painful and causing me the worst headache ever.
Basically just looking for stories about peoples’ personal experiences to see what Behçets is really like on an average day.
submitted by wildly_domestic to Behcets [link] [comments]

2024.05.15 15:19 muksak Could this rash be caused by warmer weather, spring allergies, or stress? No change in products to cause it.

Could this rash be caused by warmer weather, spring allergies, or stress? No change in products to cause it.
I have had this rash before but I've been able yo figure out what caused and it goes away after a day or 2. This has been almost a week. It was previously just the raised splotch of red on my right cheek and this morning it is now all around my left eye as well. It isn't really itchy, but I can feel the warmth of it and it makes my lower eyelids feel swollen.
No new products for my face or in the house. It has been getting warmer in minnesota and I do have a lot of environmental allergies like grass etc. But this hasn't happened before.
Anyway to calm it down other than ice packs?
submitted by muksak to DermatologyQuestions [link] [comments]

2024.05.14 03:22 SciHeart Crazy eyelid issue

Hi! I'm 43 and been doing BJJ about 3 years. I have used retinol basically the whole time and have used it on and off for over ten years.
Lately, like last six months, my upper eyelids, like right below my eyebrows all the way to the crease are so puffy and ouchy after I roll, especially in a gi. I've had an actual eyelid rash burn like 3 times now.
I don't use retinol in that area and have never had sensitive skin like this before. They get like puffy, swollen a little and like flakey after I roll and then anything I put on them like a lotion just kills. No where else on my face is doing this.
Question: what is going on with my eyes. Is this aging? Is this happening to any of you?
If it is happening to you, what are you putting on to either prevent it or heal it?? I can't stand it.
submitted by SciHeart to BJJWomen [link] [comments]

2024.05.14 03:18 PermissionNeat6855 Swollen eyelid after picking milia

Swollen eyelid after picking milia
Hey guys, so I picked a milia on my upper eyelid. I used a sterile needle and after getting the stuff out, I used topical antibiotics to help heal. Went to sleep, and next thing you know when I woke up my eyelids got swollen. I have no idea if it's infected or was it just swollen from picking, it's painful to the touch. I NEED HELP. I don't like anything that's bothering my eyes. Any tips on how I could treat it?
https://preview.redd.it/7taceo0jna0d1.jpg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c50a27b13419d47df93d070a452047e18b901e65
submitted by PermissionNeat6855 to DermatologyQuestions [link] [comments]

2024.05.14 01:30 AstronautDue2395 My Experience

My Experience
TW for gross looking eye pictures but this is the reality of the surgery
Hi, so I have kind of a unique story but maybe it can help anyone like me who’s been scouring the internet for something relatable. Long read, but would’ve been comforting for me during my search. Feel free to skip to the ***** area for the surgery/recovery details.
Fairly new here (26F), been observing posts and taking in stories for a few months now. I was born blind in my left eye due to optic nerve hypoplasia (my right eye is also nearsighted as a mf). My eyes have never tracked together well, it was visible at a few months old, and that’s how I got my initial diagnosis. It was somewhat correctable for the sake of school pictures and family pictures for the first portion of my life (closing eyes, changing position, looking away and back right before the snap, etc). Around middle school I had friends and strangers start to mention occasionally that they couldn’t tell what I was looking at or they’d ask me what was wrong with my eye. Since then I’ve been insanely self conscious and uncomfortable in my own skin, refusing to make eye contact, take pictures, FaceTime, zoom call, etc. I learned about strabismus surgery a few years back, and researched into it for a while, ultimately deciding that I wouldn’t pursue it because of the high possibility of the surgery failing, either immediately, or somewhat soon after.
Some things have happened with my health and body over the last few years, and my esotropia had become more and more noticeable, and my eyelid was dropping heavily with it. When I was tired, it would barely appear open if I didn’t force it.
I finally got fed up with hating my own face and I wanted to consult with a new doctor and see what my options were, if I had any. He never made me feel uncomfortable, or like there was something wrong with me. He did mention the possibility of failure, specifically because of the blindness and inability to focus that eye, but at this point I was willing to take the risk (how much worse could it get if I was already disappointed in my own appearance and hiding from life).
************ Surgery Details In my case, because my turn was so severe, he had to operate on 4 of the 6 muscles in my eye. Along with that came a decent amount of trauma to my eye (more than the average surgery would cause). He corrected mine on an adjustable suture, had me meet back at his office a few hours later, did an exam, and adjusted my stitches while sitting in a chair in his exam room. I spent from about 6am until about 6pm with him in one way or another before I made it home. The following days I was mostly just sore and swollen and so so tired. I kept my eyes closed for the first day and a half, because moving my right eye also moved my left eye and caused me a decent amount of pain. My operation was a Tuesday, Saturday was my absolute peak day of pain. I was prescribed a narcotic that I used for the first 3 days I believe, I also didn’t take my adhd meds those early days, because I wanted to be able to sleep and relax. I took one week off work (I work thurs-sun) and went back the next Thursday. I took things easy at work for that week, and started my normal duties again about two weeks after surgery. My work is pretty physical, so even after two weeks of chilling, that first night of my normal shift had me sore again the next day. Never underestimate how involved your eye muscles are in things that you wouldn’t normally think would affect them.
I’m now 3.5 weeks post op, I just recently had my follow up with my surgeon, he snipped one of my sutures that had surfaced and was rubbing my eyelid inside and keeping it irritated and swollen. The next day my eyelid looked a lot better and my eye was a lot less itchy. I’ve been back on tobradex drops (iykyk) and it seems to be helping with my redness as well (it’s also causing a bit of pulsatile tinnitus, which is something I didn’t expect). When looking at a point on the wall about 15 feet in front of me, my eyes track perfectly, at this moment in time. When I look at things close to me, my eye still starts to turn, and I find myself getting tired eyes quicker from being on my phone than I had before. My eye is still dropping a bit low when I look towards my right, and it raises a bit when I look to my left. I also feel (and see) some resistance when looking upwards. He mentioned that depending on how things look at my 3 month appointment in July, I could need one more surgery to correct the muscle that’s causing those issues, or I could decide to let it ride. Normally people’s redness and swelling are pretty gone by 3.5 weeks out, but the amount of work that my eye needed has left me still pretty red now, and still somewhat swollen in my eyelid. My actual pupils seem to track straight almost all of the time, and I’m already finding myself wanting to make eye contact with people more, which alone gives me so much more confidence than I’ve ever experienced. I’ve had some friends and family just look at my eyes and say things like “wow your eye looks really good.” My only regret is not doing it sooner. I thought I had done the research and made the best call for myself, but I should’ve sought out a professional so much sooner. Even if it fails at some point down the line, I’m grateful for the relief I’ve gotten for this time period and I would probably seek it out again.
My eyelid still droops a bit, even outside of the hit of swelling I have; ptosis am I right? 😅 I may seek out a plastic surgeon to have that corrected after a potential second surgery or deciding against one. I’ve also been looking into Botox injections to potentially correct it as well.
For anyone interested in more of the surfacey surgery details; mine was performed at a hospital under general anesthesia and took about 2.5 hours to complete. My surgeon/ophthalmologist is located in SW Ohio, and I fully trust him with my vision and my appearance at this point. The surgery totaled just over $26,000 and insurance covered just under $24,000, leaving me to pay around $2,600 out of pocket. Anyone interested/located in that area, please feel free to ask for his info and I’ll send it right over. In my opinion, the surgery is worth the risk, because (to me) the worst thing that can happen (barring actual medical emergencies) is that you end up unhappy with your eyes positioning (which is probably why you’re getting the surgery anyway)
I’m going to attach pics that will show: my eye turn beforehand (pretty severe esotropia and browns syndrome); the way I left the hospital with my adjustable sutures in; right after I left the adjustment; the healing process for a few days; what I believe is my current final eye positioning; and what it’s looking like today, a couple days after having one suture removed, a few days on steroid drops, with at least 4 barely visible sutures still waiting to dissolve.
submitted by AstronautDue2395 to Strabismus [link] [comments]

2024.05.11 15:32 GrouchyAlbatross4255 Reaching Out To The Community Need A Helping Hand

This is my first post on this sub. I’m a 22 year old college student. Need answers with school coming up in 3 months. I dealt with a kidney stone that ended up turning into a kidney infection. Around 2-3 weeks after still dealing with the infection and all my symptoms getting worse, I started leaking out protein in my urine. There was countless foam bubbles in the toilet and they started finding protein and blood in my urine over 5 times each. I woke up to my eyes being puffy and swollen every morning. This all started off in august of 2023 as similar to giving birth penis pain. Then it turned into the lower back left and right side and below my ribs in my sides/ abdomen sharp aching shooting killer pains, nonstop peeing essentially every 30 minutes or so, uncontrollable chills/shivering no matter how many layers I’m wearing, headaches that went on for at least half of my day, pooping and peeing blood, intensely itching all over my body but especially my ankles and calfs for hours in a row, I started getting rashes all over my body, and aching leg and calf pain in both legs. I developed iron deficiency anemia and RLS 2 weeks after the infection had not gotten better. I experienced erectile dysfunction for the first time. My urine on a daily basis for months was dark brown/red. Fast forward to 9 months later. My egfr is 125. I’m having tremors, basically nonstop muscle twitching in my calfs, and calf pain/tightness. I dealt with the lower back pain and pain below my ribs in my sides damn near everyday from august until late March of 2024. I could barely walk or move my lower back hurt so bad. My calf muscles are twitching like crazy and if it’s not there then it’s my eye, eyelid or another part of my leg. I’ve been to countless doctors visits. I’ve read of people on this sub dealing with stubborn kidney infections that took months to get under control. I need a for sure answer from someone. If my egfr is 125 and my 24 hour urine came back clear, there is absolutely no way it could be kidney disease or failure, right? My doctor and I agree I’ve had basically every symptom that is characteristic of a kidney problem. I’m wondering if there’s some type of kidney damage that isn’t significant enough to show up in egfr that could still be causing the symptoms I’m having. One of my friends diagnosed with ckd that tell me they know I’m having kidney problems. I’ve heard that probably around 50 times at least. Since my 2nd trial of antibiotic initiation cephalexin the pain in my kidney areas that haunted me for months has disappeared. The living in hell feel like I’m having a heart attack at least 50% or my day chest pain/pressure in the upper left side of my chest has gotten better. I was referred to a nephrologist because the urologist found blood and protein in my urine. The first time she said my egfr is normal and that I’m fine. I walked and endured worsening pain everyday for over 6 months. I saw the neph again in March. I told her the same symptoms are still going on and I’m getting worse not better. She went back through all my test results and pulled the 15+ combined protein and blood in urine and said that meets the criteria for doing a kidney biopsy. The papers from the visit said I had a biopsy scheduled in the next month. Then she tells me were not doing it anymore. My pcp said if it was up to her she would do the biopsy, but it obviously isn’t and is instead up to the nephrologist. I’m in a tough spot, I went to the doctor so many times trying to figure out what’s wrong with me that they already tested me for basically everything and anything else it could be. August will be the mark of me returning to school and officially a year of these symptoms going on and I would really like to have it all figured out by then. If anyone could chip in and give their two cents I would greatly appreciate it. I don’t know where to go from here. I just want to get my college degree and be working a job again. I’m really wondering if the same kidney infection that had me basically bed ridden all day everyday and took 6+ months to see improvement caused permanent irreversible damage to my kidneys. I went to at least 50 doctors and at least 25 of them said they think I have a kidney infection. I was at a mental institution dealing with the mental effects of this. The nurse told me I had bloodin my urine before they tested it, they could see it with the naked eye. The rn there then told me that with my uncontrollable shivering and everything else going on “you have a kidney infection” I’ve been to countless at least 10 hospital visits where I walk in explain my symptoms and the dr says it sounds kidney infection right away but the standard urine test results and multiple urine cultures have come back negative everytime. I accidentally stumbled upon this sub posting in kidneydisease and getting referred to here. I now think it kind of sounds I have an embedded uti and biofilms I need to attack. I was just put on cephalexin in the beginning of April and everything got better I just stopped taking it and 3 days later my chest pain and shivering/chills are back. Please someone give me advice
submitted by GrouchyAlbatross4255 to CUTI [link] [comments]

2024.05.11 01:17 Penny19977 Trying to not freak out...

I'm going to keep this short. On Wednesday I was given a tentative genital herpes diagnosis, and I'm going through my first outbreak. It's been absolute hell. I had a fever for days, have barely eaten, and can't walk. I'm on acyclovir and awaiting the actual test results. About 20 minutes ago, I noticed that one of my eyelids is very slightly swollen on the outer corner. Naturally I did a bit of googling, and I'm finding that ocular herpes is a thing- now I'm freaking out. I had no idea. I've been washing my hands, but I didn't even know that was a possibility and the doctor never mentioned it. Of course now it's after hours on a Friday, and I can't get ahold of my doctor anyways. My eye doesn't hurt, and there's not any other symptoms other than a little swelling. I'm not sure if I should be worried, but right this second I'm fighting off a panic attack, so I'd love some input.
submitted by Penny19977 to Herpes [link] [comments]

2024.05.09 23:35 bobbingblondie Skincare routine (on Lymecycline)

I've had severe redness and flaky skin with yellow pimples on my nose for the last several years. Also have had recurring issues with swollen and itchy eyelids, and random spots popping up elsewhere on my face. Finally saw a GP who took me seriously 2 weeks ago and prescribed Lymecycline which has already cleared up the flakiness (no more moisturising every 2 hours!!) and the yellow pimples are pretty much gone (are those the pustules I see a lot of other comments about?).
The redness of the nose has not really seen a change yet. Yesterday when I dropped my kid off at nursery one of the older kids just walked up to me and told me I have a red nose, which honestly made me feel so bad because I thought my face was starting to look better.
Anyway, I've been trying to figure out what I should be doing for my skincare routine to help speed things along. I currently use Liz Earle (UK brand, not sure if you get it elsewhere?) pro-biotic facewash and moisturiser. I've never really had a proper skincare regime, and TBH I don't know where to go next.
Based on what I've read here I have ordered some 10% Azelaic Acid Serum (Q+A brand) which I think I should be applying once a day after cleansing and before moisturising?
I'm also considering getting some kind of sulphur based wash/cream, as based on what I've been reading on here it seems like a lot of my symptoms might be caused by the demodex mites and I think that will help to kill them off? But I don't know when or how I would introduce that into my routine.
Or maybe I should be laying off of everything and just waiting to see what the Lymecycline achieves on it's own? The GP asked me to see her again after 3 months and if it hasn't cleared she will refer me to a dermatologist, but in 2 months I'm going to a huge family gathering and it would be nice to look normal.
Any tips appreciated.
submitted by bobbingblondie to Rosacea [link] [comments]

2024.05.09 18:15 suldaansully i’m sad and frustrated

my story: woke up on Feb 17th with a slightly swollen right eye and thought nothing of it until a few weeks later when it hadn’t gone down. Visited my GP in mid-March and she basically gaslit me and said nothing was wrong and to go to the ER if anything got worse.
My left eye was now swollen as well as my right eye but not as bad. The swelling was obvious to the touch but not visible on either eye. I then went to see an optometrist on the 6th of April for my itchy swollen eyes and after my eye exam she said my eyes were healthy but that I had blepharitis in both of them though she didn’t specific why type.
I took the micellar solution and wipes she gave me and began the routine of cleaning my eyes morning and night with 2 hot compresses each day from then on. As of this post, it’s been 5 weeks since and my left eye is normal while my right eye has now developed a small stye in the corner.
I’ve never* had a stye before and I think it might be because I’d just started putting Vaseline on my upper eyelid before bed. I’m trying not to spiral at the fact that my eyelids have never been cleaner and yet I still have a stye. Anyway my right eye is also really swollen now. The stye appeared three days ago and I’ve switched from wipes to the Optase tea tree cleaning gel as well as my hypochlorous acid spray (I’ve been using the spray for two weeks and it’s been great). I went to see my GP again today and she confirmed the stye is there and seems to be going down, I asked about being referred to an ophthalmologist and she said the NHS won’t accept any blepharitis or dry eye referrals unless you’ve been having symptoms for 12 months which honestly just made me want to give up altogether. She also said she won’t give me antibiotics as I don’t have any discharge in the eye.
Also I wanted to note that I haven’t worn makeup since the 2nd of March and I do miss it :((((
My current symptoms as of my new routine are: persistent mild swelling in my right eye, a stye, lash loss and a small amount of flakes on the ends of my upper lashes (the tea tree gel appears to be helping with the lash loss and flakes so far) I’ve added a cold compress to my routine now to hopefully help the swelling but I would welcome any and all advice especially from those in the UK like me who’ve navigated this!
submitted by suldaansully to Blepharitis [link] [comments]

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