So rent is due tomorrow, I have enough for that and no more. I need about $250 for vet visit plus Tx, $130 for Lily’s food (Royal Canin prescription food for pancreatitis), $200 to cover food for two weeks, $70 for gas, $100 for basic expenses (toiletries and stuff), and $50 for credit card payment.

Anyway, I don’t have a job right now, and I’m trying to get through my final year of grad school. I had COVID last week/am getting over COVID now. I think Lily (my dog) has an ear infection, and I’ve got to get her to the vet. I also need to buy her prescription food and cover my own expenses.

…still hasn’t been ruled out. I was trying to complete a scientific study in the midst of all these things, and I just had to change course. So I’m taking more credit hours (because you have to take more classes if you don’t do a thesis).

I will take comps to complete the degree instead. It will be okay. It just isn’t realistic anymore to think of getting a PhD. My kidney disease has progressed to stage 3, I had to go on really awful medication for it, I was diagnosed with cervical myelopathy requiring surgery, and MS…

Loans are based on credit hours taken, and I registered late because I decided at the end of the summer not to complete a research thesis due to all the health issues I have going on right now. So since I registered late, loans are delayed.

I don't see any way back from this. They're winning at consolidating all the levers of power under Trump and then using it to bend the culture and media to his will. It's succeeding and no one is putting up enough of a meaningful fight. Current efforts are arranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

I have MSG, which adds 1/3rd the amount of salt as table salt, and I thought that might do it, but… Apparently I’m supposed to be thinking in no added salt terms, which is horrifying to me, and I don’t know what to eat.

Yes!

Doctors were willing executioners in Nazi Germany. Willing to sign off on forced sterilization and long term institutionalization in this country. Be careful out there.

I remember Robert Evans saying on “It Could Happen Here” that the government would either be hostile or absent under this regime. That’s accurate. If you belong to any marginalized group, though, it’s open hostility.

A lot of especially white Americans expect systems to keep working for them and not to do them harm, and those days are over if you’re a member of a vulnerable population. Maybe they never existed. Time to develop a healthy degree of cynicism about the federal government.

I know what I’ll do, I’m not turning shit over in violation of HIPAA, but I could get fired for that in the not so distant future, and those records would still be with the institution.

We still have people seeking services constantly. Just be careful. I recently asked a medical professional what she would do if ordered to turn my health records over to the federal government, and she coldly said, “I’ll have to do whatever my institution requires.”

I just think most people haven’t gotten here yet, past the normalcy bias and recognizing the horror we face.

And parents are going to need to advocate for kids, even if that means denying consent for an evaluation by the school system. I’m sorry to say this, and I believe those professionals asking for consent do have the best interests of the child in mind.

The language of the recent EO targeting houseless individuals and the “mentally ill” is very scary. Institutionalization is very much on the table, and we need to be careful.

I know this puts parents in an awful position, but I also think they need to be thinking about this and what it might mean for children’s futures. I’m grateful that girls weren’t often diagnosed when I was a child.

A passing acquaintance with US and Nazi history shows this. And, yeah, there is absolutely privilege in being able to pass enough to squeak through the cracks without a diagnosis, I acknowledge that. But I maintain that if you can struggle through without it, don’t get it.