I Have TILT?

Or is it:

I am TILTed?

I feel TILTed?

TILTed I am?



I just read this great article on chemical sensitivity called Allergic to Life .  It was written a couple years ago but addresses gene mutations that might contribute to chemical sensitivity and brain scans that show evidence of physiological changes when exposed to poisons. I like that it indicates some progress is being made with research even if it's just this one person.

The researcher's ultimate goal is that doctors become more aware and educated so they understand how to identify those with chemical sensitivities and, therefore, provide better care. The article also addresses the naysayers who believe it's all mental which, of course, causes so much controversy it stops medical community acceptance right in its tracks. My cynical self thinks breaking through the narrow-mindedness is impossible.



And then there is the electric shock therapy some claim "cure" MCS. Whoa! I can't wait to sign up for some of that!

Of course, it's time for another terminology change. No longer Multiple Chemical Sensitivity, Environmental Illness, or Sick Building Syndrome,  it's now called "Toxicant-Induced Loss of Tolerance" or TILT. Like a pinball game? Hmmm...MCS survival is a bit of a game. Does this mean I have to change my blog name to TILT Survivor? Maybe "TILTed". I like that. It expresses how I feel most of the time.


If the abbreviated link above doesn't work at any point in time, here is the actual link:

http://discovermagazine.com/2013/nov/13-allergic-life

WHY Are You Not Listening to Me, AGAIN AND AGAIN?

I found another naturopath who is closer to me so she's only a three hour trip instead of eight hours. It's a little bit of an improvement. She also offered a fifteen-minute "meet-and-greet" so I could ask questions, scope her out before spending the big bucks. I figured I could ascertain if she was capable of listening.

My "meet-and-greet" consisted of Can you treat a patient without drugs? Do you have ANYTHING in your protocol other than drugs? I went into great detail about my drug intolerance and the many years of misery due to doctors who don't get it. In detail I defined the scope of what I call a drug: prescriptions, supplements of any kind including but not limited to herbs, vitamins, minerals, enzymes, amino acids, flavonoids, weird-ass antioxidants, and any food that acts like a drug (caffeine, herb-ish plants).

She claimed she did have alternative treatments. She mentioned a more in-depth analysis of the gene mutation interpretation that might offer some answers and options. She talked about energy treatments which I think are a waste of money but as long as they aren't drugs, she was answering my questions.

So I make the $175.00 appointment. On all my intake forms I write in bold letters, "I DO NOT DO DRUGS AND WILL NOT TRY DRUGS AS AN EXPERIMENT."

I know these appointments are more about my background than her diagnosis/treatment ideas, but as we get to the end all she's talking about are drugs. She keeps saying, "I know you said you don't take drugs, but...." She even tells me she doesn't see the point in having me do the gene mutation interpretations after all because all the related treatments are drugs. Hmmmm....and why didn't she tell me this during the meet-and-greet?

Her written treatment plan with everything she wants me to do has nine items. Other than "Go to the lab for blood work" and "Call me if you have questions", everything is a drug!

Are doctors incapable of thinking beyond poisoning patients? Have they been brainwashed into a drug culture and can't think out of their tiny, narrow-minded box?  Are they just all liars? Are they just trying to get me to spend money like any snake-oil salesman? Are they all brain dead and incapable of listening?

WHY DON'T THEY LISTEN TO ME?

Maybe I should lay down the law from now on: If you even mention drugs at any time for any reason, the appointment is FREE! LOL!

Car Shopping for the Chemically Sensitive

Chemical sensitivity makes car shopping hazardous! New cars smell of off-gassing plastics. Used cars smell of cleaning agents, air fresheners, cigarette smoke, stale perfume, or dogs. Salespeople or owners wear perfume or cologne. Dealerships smell of chemicals. The whole experience can be stressful, traumatizing and life threatening.

My last experience buying a car was ten years ago. I went from dealership to dealership and faced a number of perfumed salesmen and air freshened cars. Finally found my "farm van" sold to me by a rare fragrance-free salesperson, drove it home with all the windows down wearing a mask, and over the course of two weeks did everything possible to clean, sanitize, and de-fragrance it. Although they didn't use scented cleaners on the inside, they did clean the engine with incredibly toxic chemicals that infiltrated into the interior. I used vinegar, baking soda, and bowls of freshly ground coffee as natural air cleaners while I vacuumed it repeatedly. heated it, aired it out, and steam cleaned it with fragrance-free shampoo. It worked! I love my van. It provides a place to sleep should my house become contaminated, I use it for camping, and it hauls everything from rabbit manure to gravel to cedar wood chips to yard sale finds. It even moved me to my current residence. Unfortunately, it's getting old with 240,000 miles on it. I had no idea engines could last that long! I needed a backup vehicle.

Five years ago I started car shopping. I knew it was going to take a long time. Limited to three toxic exposures per day, it was a slow process, but I started smelling the interiors of cars. Most of the cheaper, economical cars like Toyota, Honda, Saturn, Kia, Hyundai, Fords, Chevys, and Nissans use cheap plastic for their interiors. One whiff and the migraines and nausea would start. I discovered only two cars I could tolerate well: Mini Cooper and the Smart Car. They still had a smell, especially new, but if used, the smell was hardly noticeable. The Mini Cooper dealership stopped using toxic cleaners and I found out they do not accept trade-ins with cigarette smoke or dog smell as the smells are impossible to eradicate. This gave me hope.

I test drove a Smart Car and although it was small and economical, both important requirements, the transmission shifting was noisy. It was whiny. It didn't seem to want to go very quickly and I hated the steering wheel shifting options. At eight feet long it was cute, but too small. A logging truck or semi would destabilize it by just passing by!

For years I test drove Mini Coopers. I think they are adorable and they handle well with touchy steering wheels and brakes. Unfortunately, I wasn't sure I would like the excessive shaking over bumpy roads and what seemed like a lack of visibility with some of the models. I was told I'd get used to it, but these cars are twice as expensive than others. I shouldn't have to get used to it. The last test drive I noticed the dashboard was rattling. The salesperson told me that's normal with all Minis. Hmmm... Maintenance is 20-30% more than regular cars and insurance way more expensive, too. Several salespeople offered to scout used ones for me, but no one came through. I think they prefer selling the high priced brand new ones to rich people. Of course.

When I gave up on the Mini Cooper, I felt at a loss for what to do. My mechanic suggested a Scion. I'd never heard of a Scion. They are made by Toyota. I happened to drive by a Toyota dealership early on a Sunday morning and thought I'd just go look. I just wanted to see what they looked like although I was still worried about the smell of cleaning solutions and new cars are out of the question. The manager was there and he suggested shopping for the newly-traded-in-but-not-detailed-yet cars. Brilliant! I found one car that had no smell, but it was a larger size sedan. I want a small car. This plan of action, however, was motivating.

The next day I drove to the city for some car shopping. I asked five different dealerships if I could shop their newly-traded-in-but-not-detailed cars yet. All but one said NO as it was against their policy. OK, I guess I won't be buying their cars!

Then I visited the Toyota dealership, asked the very eager, newly-hired salesboys if they were wearing cologne. One of them immediately looked disappointed so I knew he was definitely smelly. Live and learn young salesboy! But the other one said quickly and cheerfully, "I'm not!!" He grinned from ear to ear. So adorable. I asked about the newly-traded-in-but-not-yet detailed cars and he said, Sure! Whatever you need! My new, young, adorable salesboy took me to the secret lot where they hid the newly-traded-in-by-not-detailed-yet cars. Unfortunately nearly all of them were white and had way more than 100,000 miles on them. Nope. I don't do white, black, red or silver. Please! I need a pleasing color!

The next day in my little town I saw a purple car. I knew it wasn't a Smart Car since they don't come in purple. It was a Scion IQ! A Smart Car made by Toyota! Wasn't that the make my mechanic suggested? I'd never even heard or seen this model before. So cute! I did some online research. They are about 2 feet longer and sturdier than a Smart Car, better engines, with great gas mileage (35 to 40 mpg). And, of course, made by Toyota. However, Toyota discontinued the IQ last year due to disinterest. I picked my favorite color (blue), found a photo, and placed it on my desktop. I figured this was good karma.

My next trip into the city I decided to stop at the Toyota dealership, sneak into the back secret lot to see the newly-traded cars...and there it sat: the exact car that was my desktop photo! A blue 2012 Scion IQ with only 37,000 miles! It was just returned as a lease that day, but the dealership hadn't decided if they would buy it for re-sale. I knew it was my car! Unfortunately, they knew I felt this way, too, along with my special needs that I made plainly clear. I paid more than I think I should have, but as I've said time and time again, chemical sensitivity is expensive.

Although it wasn't detailed with the smelly carpet shampoo, they did clean it and I think that involved using some kind of toxic cleaner. After driving it home without a mask (I forgot it!), I was very sick all night. Not a good way to feel after buying a car.

Currently I have baking soda and freshly ground coffee in it soaking up the stink, but I can drive it wearing a mask. I am also heating it up and airing it out repeatedly, as well as using an air purifier. It's always a risk but I have confidence it'll be chemical-free with patience and effort.

I am still keeping my van for local transportation, hauling, and camping, but now by using the new car for long distance grocery runs, the van may last a little longer.

NEW BABY PHOTOS:

 

HOORAY!!
I have to admit I want to re-paint my house to match and buy a whole new BLUE wardrobe.

LOL!



Party Time!!

The dots have returned! 
 

Chair seat

I believe my anti-dot phase was just a temporary brain failure. I let those stripes stew for a couple days hoping I'd get used to them. I didn't. Blah. Blah. Blah. So I decided if I tweaked the polka-dot plan, maybe that would do the trick. And it did!

SO JOYFUL! I love it!

 

 

I'm calling it Confetti.

 

It feels like a party.



HOORAY!!

The Reality of Autoimmune Disease

This is an awesome article about what it's like to have an autoimmune disease:

 

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/08/26/whats-wrong-with-me

 

 

 More specifically, what it's like to have Hashimoto's.

 

Love her writing style and her turn of words:

 

“…multiple autoimmune diseases - each slowly developing, in sequence, like a garden coming into terrible bloom.”

 

 I can totally relate to her experiences especially the incompetent doctors and loss of self.

 

I cried my way through the whole article.

 

I get it.

Punkin Babies

Happy Halloween! My pumpkins are few and small, but I grew them! I will eat them. Until then they will sit on my newly-painted porch and look really cute.

Anti-Dots

I'm worried. I have developed an aversion to dots. BUT I LOVE DOTS!? I put dots on everything. It's my signature! I'm like Dot, the cartoon girl who loves dots!

That dress is disturbingly short!

Lots of dots in different sizes.

 

 



Dots in different colors.

 

 

 



Dots on everything.

 

 

The porch I painted was supposed to have dots. Lots of dots. Dots on the edges. Dots on the background. Dots down the vines. Dots on dots. I painted them, then painted over almost all of them. What is the matter with me?

My latest painting project is a $1 chair I bought at a yard sale over the summer. I have not been motivated so I put off painting it for a long time. Any idea I had didn't feel right. I decided to paint it different colors like my stairs and then to load it with dots like another chair I have:

I tried three times to paint dots and each time wiped them off. So it's just stripes.

Just stripes. No dots. Not one dot. The thought of dots is repulsive. The stripes are screaming for dots, but I can't do it, but it doesn't feel finished. It looks plain. But I can't do dots!

Maybe it's brain trauma of some kind? Or maybe it WAS brain trauma and now my brain has healed? Or maybe now my thing is stripes?

 

I am perplexed...and disturbed.

Freebie Therapy

I've had a bad, bad week so I thought I'd post my latest freebie. Freebies tend to cheer me up. I was at the free store at my local co-op and thought I'd look just to kill time before an appointment. The free store is a place where people can donate items for others to take. Like a mini Freecycle. I've donated lots of stuff like business suits and shoes, scarves and jewels, books and frames, toaster ovens and rugs. The stuff disappears fast so there is a constant turnover. Normally I don't see anything I would want and there wasn't much there, but I needed something. I found a black 100% cotton cardigan with cute little buttons. I had to wash it a couple times, but it doesn't stink. The photo makes it look washed out, but it's not. It's just the lighting. I love black. It goes with all my black things. I'm not sure why anyone would donate it. Maybe they were tired of it?

Hooray for freebies!

September Movie Reviews

Five stars means I love it so much I will watch it more than once, four stars means it was great but probably won't see it again, three means it was good, two means it was tolerable but not great, and one star means I probably turned it off before it was over.

Black or White is about a grandfather (Kevin Costner) who has custody of his granddaughter since her mother, his daughter, died in childbirth. His wife dies unexpectedly in a car accident and the little girl's African American paternal grandmother thinks she needs to come live with her and her big family. Octavia Spencer plays the paternal grandmother who is raising most of her relatives kids. Although she's a strong, capable woman, she has a blind spot when it comes to her crack-addicted useless son. Costner...hmmm...granted he was supposed to be drunk throughout the whole movie, but it was more like he couldn't quite get his lines right. His timing was off. Interesting how both legal teams were constantly working their case around racism, but it didn't have anything to do with racism. People love to hate and love to promote hate. If they would put as much effort into getting along and working together, the world would be a better place. **

The Deep Blue Sea is an English movie about a woman married to an aristocrat. She falls in love with a dashing young man and leaves her boring life, but he doesn't love her as much as she wants, he forgets her birthday so she tries to kill herself. Absolutely weird. It was exceptionally melodramatic and the high pitched screeching of violin music nearly drove me insane. Rachel Weisz has really awesome hair. Great 1950's London sets and costumes. **

Gemma Bovery is a French movie with English subtitles about a baker who is fixated on literature. He lives in a beautiful little French village where the author of Madame Bovary lived and wrote his book. When his new English neighbors move in with the last name Bovery he imagines the very attractive wife to be a Madame Bovary character. He assumes, like Madame Bovary, she is bored with her circumstances. When she starts screwing the gorgeous young man who lives in the nearby chateau, it only makes the baker more obsessed with her. It has moments of subtle humor and the scenery is gorgeous. I'd love to live in France. ***

Glory is about the 54th Massachusetts Colored Regiment led by Robert Gould Shaw during the Civil War. Although I first saw this movie when it came out years ago, I recently read a book on Shaw and the 54th.  War is disturbing anyway, but the way they used to just stand there, lined up, out in the open waiting to get shot is a bit shocking. That would take a whole lot of courage. Shaw was only 27 years old when he was killed in one of the battles and he was buried on the battlefield with his soldiers. Outstanding story and movie. *****

Night at the Museum was about a newly-hired night guard at the Museum of Natural History where all the displays come to life at night due to some Egyptian curse. I loved the plug on the benefits of learning about history. It's a kid's movie, but the pace was fast and unlike so many adult movies I've watched lately, I never got bored once! It has an all-star cast with Mickey Rooney, Dick Van Dyke, and Robin Williams with Ben Stiller playing the lead character. It was all about conflict management and learning to work together. Great themes for kids. I love the T-Rex bones...he just wanted to play fetch. LOL! ****

Neighbors is about a fraternity that moves next door to a couple with a new baby. It was incredibly, repulsively stupid in every way possible EXCEPT Zach Efron is half naked most of the time. ***********

Redwood Highway is about an older woman who was put in a convalescent center by her son and is tired of everyone telling her NO all the time. So she walks 80 miles down the Redwood Highway to attend the wedding of her granddaughter. She reminisces about her own wedding, honeymoon, and memories as she makes memories with the people she encounters along the way. Outstanding scenery of the southern Oregon area which is spectacularly beautiful year round. It's a sweet, feel-good movie, maybe too sweet to be realistic or interesting. Can a son put his mother in a home without her permission? She was perfectly sane and healthy. Hmmm... Kind of reminded me of Wild and made me want to put a backpack on and walk long distance. I desire to make more memories. ***

Rewrite is about a famous Hollywood screenwriter, a "one-hit-wonder", who hasn't worked for a while because no one is interested in what he has to offer. He has lost all confidence in himself. As a way to pay bills, he gets a job teaching at a small, east coast college, but his "you can't teach talent" attitude and his cavorting with students old enough to be his children gets him in trouble. I like Hugh Grant. He's great at dry, sarcastic humor which was perfect for this story. He's aging (aren't we all) which I find disturbing. Celebrities aren't supposed to get old! It makes me feel old! He has such outstanding comedic timing and the lines he has in this movie are exceptional. Marisa Tomei is also great. It's heartwarming, and although it has a "teaching-is-a-rewarding-profession" theme, it is not sappy nor overdone. I enjoyed it. ****

Still is an English movie with the actor from Game of Thrones who plays Littlefinger. It's about teenage gangs: Are these hoods criminals or still children? One gang of thugs starts harassing this man, shoving excrement into his mailbox, calling him late at night and breathing into the phone, harassing him when he's walking down the street, banging on his door or screaming outside his house in the middle of the night, and leaving dead cats on his porch. I'm still not clear why he brought the bag INTO his house, dumping the rotting corpse into the bathtub, and then vomited uncontrollably. I realize it was just for effect or we'd never know there was a dead cat in that bag, but a sane person would have taken it to the garbage can to inspect the contents, with "inspecting the contents" not a requirement. He knew it was from the gang. He blows them off as just kids even though other kids in the neighborhood are getting killed by these sleazeballs, then their behavior escalates, and he takes action. And it's really good revenge action. He actually might have gotten away with it. It was a little slow, kind of depressing, but an interesting story. **

Unfinished Song is about a crotchety old man who doesn't seem to get along with anyone and who's cheerful wife sings in a choir because it brings her joy, probably the only joy in her life since she lives with him. Then she dies and he decides to join the choir. I like Vanessa Redgrave who plays the wife. It's incredibly sappy portrayal of grief which I found unbearable, but more irritating was the attitude of the man and his rude behavior toward everyone. Normally there is some epiphany, or disclosure behind the reason a character makes you want to hate them, but there wasn't. It was also extremely unrealistic to expect us to believe people who can't sing win a singing contest, but it was all about the sap with this movie. Realism took a back seat. **

Wild Tales is an Argentinian foreign film about revenge. Six very strange stories about people's perception of injustice and the last straw that pushes them over the edge. Some of it was rather funny, or sick, I guess, depending on how one looks at it. It definitely makes you think twice about ever being mean to someone as karma is a bitch. I liked the road rage story. The photography was at times outstanding, the way they framed shots, especially in the first couple stories. ***