I have been reading 10 Reasons to Delete Your Social Media by Jaron Lanier. He talks about how the algorithms used on Twitter/Facebook (he hates Google too) are specifically designed to increase anxiety, depression, and addictive like behaviors. Which in turn make you irritable and upset.

Noah says he does see such upticks in my behavior.

Maybe part of trying to maintain stability without medication is deleting my account. Again. And never coming back this time. I keep having conversations with people about this book and the constant response is, “But I would lose contact with people I care about because the only way I hear from them is Facebook/Twitter/etc.”

Maybe if you only know people through a broadcast medium that makes you feel upset… you aren’t really hearing from them?

This is literally why I write letters. If I want to stay in touch with you I will fucking stay in touch with you. It takes me a while to circle through everyone… because I stay in touch with a lot of people… but that’s ok! That’s how much I genuinely have to give people instead of putting out broadcasts that people don’t care that much about. I invite people into the postcard circle. If they prefer to hear from me on Twitter…

Maybe they don’t need to hear from me at all.

That’s ok, too.

One reason I like Twitter is because it keeps me in touch with what is happening to other people with chronic pain and other people who have been abused by the system. It’s validating as fuck. The writers from Twitter that make the most difference for me… I already follow on Patreon. I should probably delete my Instagram too. Noah points out that I am giving Facebook pictures of my kids and I feel sick about that.

It’s the whole individualist vs group identity thing. Social media lets me feel validated from people like me… but I often get just as much validation from people who aren’t like me and maybe that is a better way to deal with life.

We have a rental car right now. It doesn’t make my life better. It means I spend a lot of time driving and that hurts my arms and back really badly. We did go to Dole Plantation because my kids love mazes and that’s the biggest one in the world. Well, that’s sort of in dispute. But we stopped on the road trip every time there was a maze. The kids would have been sad to miss out on another opportunity.

It was fascinating exploring how much of this island is still kind of remote. There aren’t many services with a 45 drive and that’s basically rural. We have been staying on the side populated by locals. We are near the homeless camps, away from the wealthy houses. That’s way better for me on every level.

I think some of the homeless folks have been having fun at my expense and I really don’t care. They tell me outrageous stories and I don’t argue with them and they go back to their friends and laugh uproariously. Ok. I don’t care.

I understand why people need to laugh at visible outsiders who appear to be rich. I accept it as part of the price I pay for being wealthy. I spent my childhood doing anything I could to make people at my current level look ridiculous. Turn about is fair play.

I didn’t finish packing yesterday and I feel some distress about that. Today I need to finish packing, do some laundry, drop stuff off at a thrift store, and see if I still have room in the bag to get souvenirs for nieces and nephews. I am not in weekly or even monthly contact with all my nieces and nephews, but I try hard to always get them things from the far off places we go. Sometimes it takes me a while to mail it… (like the packets I sent out last week that included a bunch of stuff I found over the years) but I think of you! You are important! Getting to the post office is a challenge for some reason I don’t understand.

My aunts and uncles never thought of me. I was never important. My nieces and nephews will know all of their lives that I think of them and believe they are worth effort. Maybe it will turn into adult relationships someday and maybe it won’t. But I will have done what I wish adults did for me and that’s the best I can do.

Well, Auntie let me live with her when my mother couldn’t feed or house me. But presents were uhhhh… yeah. Not a big part of our language. When she did give me presents they were often wildly inappropriate in one direction or another. Like she gave me Vanity Fair (the novel, not the magazine) when I was 8. Then she gave me a bunch of middle school level books when I was in high school because she thought my reading was too adult. (I was reading adult romance novels which were seriously pornographic.)

Well my 18th birthday and my graduation from high school were uhhh on the nose present holidays. I was given pots and pans, dishtowels,  and other stuff to get the fuck out.

And they expressed, after I was 18, surprise that I left and didn’t come back. You never wanted me and as soon as it was legal for me to go you told me to get out. What the fuck do you expect from me? That I will waste all my spare time trying to visit you so you can treat me with contempt?

My self esteem isn’t that low.

I’ll stick with social media for depressing me, thanks.

I hate the bed in this apartment. I have slept for shit all month and my back is incredibly sore. I can’t wait to get to Thailand. Massage is $4/hour.

Hey…. there’s Thai massage 10 minutes from where we are staying in PDX. Nice.

But first, Japan and Scotland. In Japan there is a Thai massage place 25 minutes away by train. And in Scotland there is a place 40 minutes away by bus.

Ok. Maybe I will continue to be able to walk. Excellent.

I have already completely stuffed 12 bags and a 13ths is pretty mandatory because that bag is a pain in the ass to pack in another bag. That’s not so bad! Our number of “stuff” bags is going down rapidly.

I need to figure out what to do with the forking car seat. It isn’t even valid in Japan or Scotland due to differences in country regulations so I need to leave it here. Or maybe if no one wants to pick it up from my craigslist ad I will bring it from country to country and then we won’t need to buy one in PDX. I don’t know.

I feel overwhelmed at the moment.

My big kids can only really be expected to handle their two bags. That leaves 8-9 for Noah and I to handle. That’s… a lot.

I have decided that public transit to and from airports is ridiculous and we will take fucking taxis.

Getting to our apartment in Malaysia was incredibly stressful and I don’t need to duplicate that experience. Taxis are usually only about 10% more expensive (for 4 people) than public transit and they are faster, easier, and I don’t have to worry about finding a fucking address in a different country.

I really wish I was sleeping better. I need to take Ativan tonight. I have to sleep before the flight. I’m going to have like 12 hours of babywearing in front of me. I was S_M_R_T and I packed the tens unit in my carry on. Once I am through security I am going to put it on in the bathroom and that will hopefully make the journey less hellish.

Her Sweetness is almost 24 fucking pounds.

I think it is funny how much strangers feel free to talk about how fat my babies are. “Wow. That kid is huge. How old is she? !!!!!! My kids weighed that much when they were 3 years old!!!!”

Ok? What’s your point?

Have you noticed that my 10 year old is the same height as you and outweighs you? We aren’t built like you….

I have spent my children’s entire lives waiting for the point when they would cross the line from having a little pudge for growing into being really overweight and it has never happened. We are really active. This is the way their bodies are supposed to be shaped.

Eldest Child read a book called Our Bodies, Our Bikes (it’s by a lot of different authors) because I am trying to get her to understand more of what it means to have a body and to be active with that body. She has a growing awareness of how weight conscious the world is. She says she is happy I deliberately and consciously kept that fact from her for most of her life. I’m glad you don’t feel betrayed, kiddo. I was worried. A study in 2010 showed that 80% of American girls have dieted by 10 years old.

Fuck. That. Shit.

I spend a lot of time talking about how much I love my fat belly because it is proof I am lucky enough to be a mother. My body wasn’t shaped like this before I had kids and I am really thrilled about having them. I spend a lot of time looking at pictures of severely obese people and talking about how gorgeous and awe inspiring they are. We used to have pictures on the wall of naked fat people because they are fantastic art.

If someone makes a negative comment about my body in front of my kids I respond with, “I love my body–are you crazy?” Which isn’t cool because crazy is an awful word… but it’s a deliberate attempt to shame people for saying my body isn’t as it should be.

Yeah, I will shame you if you tell me to lose weight. If you don’t want to be shamed for fat hating… stop fat hating. Easy problem to solve.

EC has stopped listening to youtube gamers who fat shame because she doesn’t like it. I consider that a massive victory.

Every body is good. Bodies come in a lot of different shapes. There are advantages and disadvantages to every possible body configuration. Play to your strengths, don’t spend time bemoaning the body you wish you had and get on with life. You are good enough just how you are. There might be sports that are harder or easier for you based on your shape, but having the non-ideal shape doesn’t mean you can’t do it at all… it just may take more practice.

There are bodies built for swimming or running really fast. But you can swim or run (well really, walk fast) at just about any body size. Disabilities change all of this and they are normal and natural and it’s great that medical science helps people find ways to do things that would have been hard or impossible 200 years ago.

Yay science!

I talk a lot about the strength involved in being fat. It’s wonderful. I talk about maintaining flexibility and strength no matter what shape you are because health is the goal… not looking any particular way. We can’t all look the same. That’s just fucking life.

Look how you look. And love yourself.

You will get one body. Be nice to it. It took me a long time to learn how to be nice to my body and I pay for that. Let’s figure it out for your kids while you are young and then… maybe you won’t hurt like me in 30 years.