u/alivingstereo

Tá muito quente, não aguento mais. Eu sou de Salvador, mas o verão em Londres sempre parece pior do que o calor soteropolitano. Eu não consigo dormir, não consigo comer, não consigo respirar. E parece que só piora com o passar dos anos. Vejo muita gente sofrendo com depressão sazonal no inverno, mas a minha só aparece no verão. É a época do ano que, por incrível que pareça, me dá saudades de minha terra natal. Vontade de chorar o tempo todo. Comprei um ar condicionado portátil e tem ajudado, mas não sei mais o que fazer. Me preocupo com meus gatos. Enfim. Por aí, como tão lidando?

It’s too hot right now. I can’t deal with this heat, I don’t function, I get overwhelmed in 5 minutes. I love my life in London but summer here is AWFUL. It gets waaaaaay too hot. And I’m from Brazil, of all places. My hometown is permanently between 25-30 degrees celsius. But at least places are designed for this kind of weather, most places have aircon, plus there’s the beach. I honestly don’t know what to do. I bought a portable air con and it’s doing wonders in my house, but I have to go to work this week, when it’ll be 35 degrees. No aircon in the tube nor in my workplace. Oh, and I’ll have to go for a fucking day long walk this week for my work. But I feel that even when I’m wearing bikini at the park is too hot. Last heatwave, not even a month ago, I literally fainted inside a bus.

Coloquei a flair "história", mas é mais um desabafo mesmo.

Moro na Inglaterra, onde adotei dois gatos com meu marido, também brasileiro. Ursula, de 4 meses, e Drauzio, de 9 meses (fotos abaixo). Moro em um apartamento e amanhã vem um profissional telar as janelas e a varanda (até então, como não estava fazendo calor, simplesmente estávamos sem abri-las).

Já foi MUITO rolê achar alguém que tele apartamento. Até tem empresa que vende o material, mas achar profissional é muito difícil e nem eu nem meu marido confiamos no nosso taco o suficiente. Achei um profissional brasileiro, amém.

Mas por que é difícil? Porque aqui ter gato sem acesso à rua é raro, muitas vezes consideram CRUEL. A questão é que, quando eu morava no Brasil, eu era voluntária de abrigo de gatos e a gente era bem chatinho com essa coisa de gato dar voltinha na rua. Aqui é completamente o oposto.

Para vocês terem noção, a gente só adotou nossos gatos por vias "clandestinas" (entre mil aspas). Com Drauzio, uma brasileira achou uma gata grávida perdida na rua, sem microchip. Ela nos deu um filhote e ficou com a gata adulta, já castrada. Com Ursula, fomos em uma única ONG que aceitava adotante que morasse em apartamento (Celia Hammond, o nome da ONG, caso você more em Londres, e eu recomendo eles do início ao fim). Todas as outras nos rejeitavam de imediato porque "criar gatos sem acesso à rua é crueldade animal".

Ontem eu fiquei muito irritada. Levei Ursula no veterinário para tomar a segunda dose da vacina. Ao chegar lá, o veterinário queria passar vermífugo. Como ela tinha tomado mês passado, quando adotamos, perguntei o porquê, já que ela não estava com sinal de verme. E ele: "Tem que vermifugar todo mês". Achei estranho, já que a recomendação dos vets que já fui no Brasil era de 1x por ano. Daí lembrei que é porque os gatos aqui saem na rua e falei: "Ah, mas ela é indoor". E o veterinário me olhou com UMA CARA e disse: "Bom, sua escolha, mas saiba que você está causando sofrimento ao animal".

Meu apartamento é todo gatificado, temos prateleiras, árvores e ainda brincamos com os gatinhos 2x por dia. Damos ração úmida 2x e ração dura super premium. Fiz uma pesquisa rápida aqui e 630 gatos são atropelados TODOS OS DIAS no Reino Unido inteiro. Isso dá cerca de 230 MIL atropelamentos por ano. Atropelamentos são a maior causa de mortes para gatos aqui, quase 60% das mortes são por causa de gato sendo atropelado. Isso sem contar que tem RAPOSAS aqui dentro de Londres. Literalmente toda noite eu sou acordada com som de raposa e eu nem moro em subúrbio.

Meu marido tava contando que, no trabalho dele, ele também é visto como um doido por manter os gatos indoor. O colega dele já perdeu 3 gatos atropelados e simplesmente fala que "ah, é só pegar outro". COMO SE FOSSE UM OBJETO!!!!!!

Ah, e sabe qual a cereja do bolo? Sabe aqueles colares com sinos que são polêmicos em alguns lugares do mundo, incluindo o Brasil? Aqui é padrão os gatos usarem, pois o pessoal diz que "afasta os pássaros" e evita destruição da fauna. Ninguém acha crueldade, o que pra mim é surreal. Sabe o que ajudaria a evitar a destruição da fauna???? Isso mesmo, deixar seu gato dentro de casa!!!!!!

Ah, e tem outra: antes de me mudar pra esse apartamento, eu morava de aluguel em uma casa que tinha um jardinzinho na frente. Todo santo dia, os gatos do nosso vizinho faziam cocô ali. Cheguei a falar com ele, na esperança que ele fosse pelo menos limpar, e ele deu de ombros e disse: "São gatos, não tenho como impedir que eles vão para seu jardim".

Só para terminar, tem uma única exceção para deixar gato sem acesso à rua, adivinhem qual é???? Isso mesmo, se o gato for de raça e tiver pedigree. Sabem pq? Porque eles têm medo de alguém roubar os gatos e nem mesmo as ONGs deixam você adotar gato de raça com acesso à rua. Tipo?????

https://preview.redd.it/yurvyjtmzz7h1.jpg?width=960&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2ff9c6252aeef378f5b3dbbd15d7cd9de5ce9d27

Enfim, foto de Ursula e Drauzio para terminar esse desabafo.

Hi. I’m not using hormonal contraception at the moment. I noticed something “weird” about my periods and wanted to know if this is something that other people with endometriosis experience.

Basically, I have very VEEERY light spotting two days before my period arrives. I see it on toilet paper but not on my underwear. It takes 2-3 days to my period actually comes in “full”. It’s always been like this. The thing is that I feel every period symptom on those days: cramps, horrible pelvic pain, constipation (I have endometriosis lesions on my rectum)

As a teenager, I asked a doctor how to track my period as she told me I shouldn’t count these spotting days as my period. Only when it comes in larger quantity. Not sure if she was correct.

Anyway, does anyone else experience it?

Hi

I'm 29 years old and was diagnosed with autism when I was 23. I don't disclose my diagnosis to many people, only the closest friends and family (my mother and grandma were diagnosed after I was). I never disclosed at work, for example.

Now I'm doing a PhD, 1st year. Overall, it's been great, mainly because I've been finding 90% of it very autistic-friendly. My PhD is in social sciences so I don't have to go to campus every day, which is awesome. I just work from home surrounded by my cats. Lovely.

The thing is that... I have 3 supervisors, two of them are fine, buto ne of them is super tricky. The issue is that this tricky supervisor has some sort of power over the other two because she's a Professor and the other two aren't. She's not direct at all. For a little bit of context, considering that the majority of Reddit is based in US, I'm based in the UK, but I'm Brazilian. I've noticed that here people aren't direct when they don't like something, they tend to be passive-aggressive sometimes. Anyway, I've been living in the UK for quite a while now so I've learned how to identify when someone doesn't like something. With this specific supervisor, it's still hard though. I explicitly ask her for direct feedback, and she only gives me vague comments, including that she's not here to tell me what to do and that I have to find it out for myself. Sometimes, she says some mean stuff when the meeting is over like "I have some more important things to do".

I had a weird situation with her recently. She asked me to send written work 48 working hours before our meetings. I always do. But, for our last meeting, I accidentally clicked in 'reply' instead of 'reply all' in the email thread with my supervisors and she didn't receive it. In the meeting, she was quite passive-aggressive and said that now she wants me to send written work 7 working days in advance. This left me with very little time to work on my things, so I ended up sending something quite bad, and I'm ashamed.

Because I've been enrolled in the disability services due to my chronic health condition, I decided to ask them for help. The officer suggested that I disclose my diagnosis to them, but I'm not sure how. One of my supervisors has ADHD, so I thought of disclosing to her first before disclosing to the other two.

I feel like this is making my PhD harder than it should be. I just wanted more direct feedback and more understanding, that's it.

Hi, I'm struggling a bit with a friend of mine. It's her 30th birthday this weekend, and we've been friends for almost 10 years. When she invited me, she said "but you have to drink with me". I said I didn't want to drink, but she kept saying "but it's my birthday, no discussions".

What bothers me is... why? Like, I understand she wants to have fun on her birthday, but why do I need to drink? I can be fun without alcohol. In fact, alcohol only makes me sleepy, not particularly fun. She can drink as much as she wants, fine by me, but why force me to do it just because it's her birthday? This doesn't make any sense.

Anyway, this isn't the first time she's tried to force me to drink, and it always makes me upset. For context, I was never a heavy drinker but I would drink on weekends. For over a year now, I barely drink, and could easily spend two months without any drop of alcohol, choosing to drink only if it's a glass of a really good wine. I stopped drinking for two main reasons: 1) I love running and exercising regulates me, 2) I have endometriosis, and it turns out alcohol triggers my symptoms even when I'm not on my period. I think it's because I've never had an issue with alcohol abuse; if I had, I believe she would respect my sobriety. Weirdly, she's a doctor, so she, in theory, should understand why people stop drinking because of chronic illnesses, right? But I also know that some doctors - mainly those who work in emergency and intensive care like her - have a crazy lifestyle, and some struggle with and normalise substance abuse. She personally doesn't have a drinking problem but I think she's believes that if she can deal with a crazy work pattern, I can mess up a bit with my routine, so maybe she thinks that I'm just being annoying???

Hi

My dad and stepmother are visiting me in London from abroad, and it’s my stepmum’s birthday this Thursday. She wants to eat Italian food. Bocca di Lupo was my first suggestion but they’re fully booked on Thursday. The thing is that they can be a bit hard to please when it comes to food. Two days ago, for example, I took them to St John Bread and Wine and they didn’t like it (and kept complaining about how the toasts were cold and there was too much bread????). Anyway, before I start venting here, I’d like some restaurant recommendations for Italian food. Thanks

Hi, I don't want advice, I just want to complain and see if others can relate. Unfortunately, there's not much to be done about it. We all have to do unpleasant things in life, right? I just need to suck it up and be a grown-up, I guess.

When I was in corporate, the hardest thing for me was to socialise. I just wanted to get my work done, then leave home. I bet many people out there can relate. It doesn't help that I'm on the autistic spectrum, and socialising drains my energy. But, as I said, we all have to deal with frustration sometimes.

Now, in academia, I'm very lucky to manage to do 98% of my work from the comfort of my house. It's just me, my books, my laptop, a whiteboard, and my silly little cat. Perfect. When I was having mandatory classes, I would dread my commute to the campus. I have some friends who are doing their PhD as well and I genuinely like them, so that part is nice. But meeting people just for the sake of 'networking'? Pfffff awful. I'm already dreading these upcoming weeks because I have two big events to attend, which I hate. Unfortunately, they are necessary in academia because, well, it's how you meet fellow academics and promote your work.

The other day, my husband joked that I had the job I was born to do: study, write, research. I laughed, then said it back: 'You forgot the part that you have to go to events, talk to people, make sure people like you and like your work'. Of course, he replied that every job is like this, which is 100% true, so I guess I just have to suck it up and pretend it's not dreadful, I guess.

I wish I were Elena Ferrante. No one knows who she is, she just writes her stuff, makes a living, and gets herself read out there.