u/letter420elise

(main part of my post isn’t about gynecology specifically, but further down is)
TW for CSA description

Man I fucking hate my life. After a lifetime of trauma and hardship, I’ve gotten better at not falling into pessimism, but holy fuck.

For context I’ve had scoliosis my entire life. Two curves, lumbar and thoracic. Have always been told it’s moderate - not mild, but not super severe. Must’ve inherited from my grandmother because she has the same, along with a bunch of other similar health issues. We caught it early, when I was about 10, and thankfully my family had a very knowledgeable doctor who treated it for 11 years. As a kid, my shoulders were so off balance that my hoodies would fall off one side of my body. For years now, my shoulders have been completely symmetrical. Just to give you an idea. He did a lot of good for me, outside of that one time he berated me in front of my abusive mother which made her fall into her manipulative bullshit after the appointment, but whatever. He helped my spine. 🫠

Last December, two days before my appointment with him (and after he rescheduled it 3 times), his receptionist calls me and says he’s not taking me as a patient anymore. No final appointment, no sorry, just done. Ok. I asked for a script for physical therapy and he forwarded that to me at least.

Been in PT since. My PTs are wonderful ladies, super knowledgeable about the nervous system and how my CPTSD impacts my body. That being said though, they’ve started to mention surgery a lot recently. I’m 22, and surgery is generally recommended below 30 as your body can adapt better, and with how pretty bad my scoliosis is, it could get a lot worse over time. Like start to crush my lungs, maybe. So it’s best if I do it now.

My previous doc, I believe, was under the mindset that we could at the very least maintain it and keep my quality of life without surgery. Which I appreciate. After my experiences, I already don’t see doctors in general, but especially none that push procedures.

Now I’m spiraling.

I’m a tattoo artist. I can’t imagine life without my job, but it can fuck up even the healthiest of bodies over time. My job is already limited due to my scoliosis. But if surgery goes badly then I may not be able to ever do it again. I’d have to take months off to recover. I’d have to go back and stay with my parents. Tattooing is the only thing that brings me true joy right now.

My mom had a spinal injury some years back that’s fucked up her life since. She almost died during the surgery when I was a teenager.

I’ve spent the past 5 years healing from other chronic illness (that doctors have loved to deny) and just this past month or two I’ve actually been able to return to semi-normalcy. Like I can actually do work 6 hours a day for the first time since I was 16. I finally started to get a glimpse of maybe not having to worry about my autoimmune issues caused by my trauma so much.

I’ve healed a lot from my trauma, but I still can’t imagine facing any sort of procedure where I have to take my clothes off or go under anesthesia again. I can’t even bring myself to get my fucking wisdom teeth removed because of it. All I can think about is being five years old, having urinary tract issues, and having whatever-it-was shoved up there against my protests. And then eight, having extremely horrible periods already and getting tested for PCOS, when this fuckass doctor at some renowned medical college digitally raped and assaulted me in front of my mother while my mother yells at me to shut the fuck up and stop crying.

I thought I had moved past this.

I guess I never will.

I don’t know what to do and my life is already falling apart right now. I know I don’t have to make a decision at this moment but it causes me panic whenever I think about it.

Fuck me. Fuck doctors. Fuck the medical establishment.

Fuck fuck fuck.

Thanks for letting me vent.

Tattooer from Michigan here. Learned recently that I most likely qualify for Canadian citizenship per a recent law. I’ve already considered moving to Canada for about a decade but never truly pursued it due to life circumstances. Now that I may have this opportunity, I’m curious how the tattoo industry is doing in Canada (compared to the US)? Particularly in larger cities like Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver. I know Canada is suffering in general as well, and the tattoo world is struggling all over, but I haven’t been able to find information particular to it for Canada at the moment.

Hope this is allowed. Thanks! 🍁

I’m in a suburb of a large city. We get solicitors quite a lot but this is different. Yesterday around 2pm this middle aged guy starts banging on the front door. He stands there for like 5 minutes and knocks 6 separate times. Eventually he gives up and goes to this black truck parked directly in front of our house and sits for 15 minutes before driving off. I noticed he was holding a piece of paper but no clipboard or anything. No marking on his clothes or truck, just a black polo with weird baggy tan pants and sunglasses.

Just happened again, 8:30am. This time he was in a different car, an older silver sedan. Banged hard as hell on the door and eventually went and sat in the car for a few minutes then left. Again no company markings or anything.

No note or anything was left on our front porch, and he wasn’t going door to door around the neighborhood. There’s a lot of work being done on our street but in that case we’d get a note from the city on our door handle (speaking from experience).

I’m just really freaked out. I’m a single woman who’s home alone and I don’t answer the door for any strangers. There’s been a lot of robberies in my city recently so maybe I’m just paranoid, but I’m both scared to be home alone and leave the house unattended. What should I do?

Unfortunately couldn’t get any license plate numbers

Partner of 32M DX here (unmediated for years and never been in therapy). Sorry if this is worded wrong, I’m typing fast. I’m wondering if it’s at all possible for (particularly male) ADHD folks to bring up grievances/boundaries/transparent communication?

I.e.: “You did this thing and it upset me” (before blowing up/melting down) or “ Hey babe, I did [xyz thing] that I realize breaks your boundaries and I wanted to be honest with you” etcetera

(obviously I know it’s “possible” but is there any way I could ever expect him to start doing this? I just want honest communication ffs 🙃)

Hi all, definitely not a tech expert here. I got the iPhone 15 Pro almost three years ago now. Worst phone I've ever had. To be fair, I think something has been wrong with the camera (the entire reason I upgraded...) since I got it but I never had the energy to make it back to the store so that's my bad. Same with my MacBook, which I only got because it was required at my college. I also disliked my previous 12 Pro Max but not as much. In all honesty I still miss & dream of my 6S lol.

In any case, I've been becoming increasingly tired of Apple more and more over the past months and years, but I've already been tied to the Apple ecosystem for probably 15 years now. I've never used anything else. Plus, all of my friends & family have iPhones so I do enjoy the messaging features (outside of work & AirDrop, it's the only thing holding me back lol). But I'm starting to want a different phone and I'm not sure what route to take. I need a high quality camera and access to social media for my job, which is what makes it difficult. With wanting to get away from social media & AI as much as possible, part of me wants to just get a flip phone and a separate camera for work, but I can already tell I'd get sick of the hassle pretty quick. I wish I had just gotten the 13 Pro Max a few years ago, but it feels pointless now when it may not be supported for many more years. I'm increasingly open to switching to a different brand, but I wouldn't be able to buy a new phone, laptop, and tablet all at once which would make syncing up work difficult. I remember I used to get so excited when I'd get a new device, but now the thought of getting a new iPhone honestly fills me with dread 🙃

I'm open to any ideas, just not sure what or where I should start considering. Thanks for any input!

I hope it’s okay for me to share this here. This is all a first draft that I just finished, but I wanted to see if it makes sense in other people’s eyes. Apologies for the length, but it’s my best attempt at explaining my experience with being a woman. Just hoping it can maybe help another woman, or man, out there. Feedback welcome. TW for themes of assault --

For months I’ve been attempting to explain to some men close to me, who despite their arguably inconsiderate way of asking, do truly want to have a better understanding of the female experience. At the end of those discussions, I’m always posed with the same questions: Well what does it feel like? Why does it affect you so much? I’ve been racking my brain for the magic words to describe the ever-looming sense of violation over womanhood, or some analogy they could understand from their lived experience, but every metaphor or description always falls flat. I believe, maybe, I’ve finally found one.
It’s reductive, but in my experience I’ve found that men tend to view communication with a goal to logically understand and act, whereas women view it as a means of empathy and cohabitation in emotion. Trying to bridge that gap is difficult; I don’t believe there’s a single word in any language that can truly encompass an emotion - especially when, as a woman trying to express this to a man, men are taught to suppress any and all emotion. That’s what led me to this metaphor. Shame. ;;

Think of all the times you were told you weren’t man enough. Too feminine. Too sensitive or emotional. Too fat or too skinny. Too loud. All of the times you were punished; for doing poorly on an assignment, for being awkward in public, for not making your bed, for saying the wrong thing. All of it. 

Put aside biological differences for a minute, and imagine living in an alternate universe where your life is the same, but women historically hold the power. They assert it through shame. You’re male. By the age of five, your father is already telling you, “Hey son, there’s some bad women out there who want to hurt you…” and somehow you’re already aware of the concept of women hitting men, of women women screaming at their husbands and pinning them down and whipping them to shame them. Throughout your childhood your father tells you: You’re too confident, women don’t like strong men. No, you can’t keep doing that hobby, you’ll get too good at it. Don’t speak, the women are speaking right now. Girls call you stupid and laugh at you because they like you.

Meanwhile you become “Mommy’s Boy”. She says you’re different - you’re perfect at failing, you’re so much more pathetic than other boys, that you’re the good one. Your father speaks and she laughs; your father says his opinion and she rolls his eyes, berating him behind his back when you’re in the car on the way home from school later on. 

You’re surrounded by magazines, shows, movies, video games, music, all catered to young boys. All of that media is marketed as Cry and She’ll Like You! How to Get Your Crush to See How Small and Pathetic You Truly Are! Covers of magazines, long expositions in movies, the most popular video game characters, all depict weak men crying and cowering. 

You’re a little boy, and you have ADHD but you don’t know it yet. You can’t get your assignments done on time, you forget your chores, and your entire life revolves around avoiding the punishment of your parents. Before the age of 10, you’re already developing a “confidence disorder”; subconsciously you’ve learned you live in a world where your desired form is that of a weak, pathetic, shamed man. That’s what the women want, right? That’s what your dad is teaching you, right? That’s what your mom is rewarding, right? You’re already filled with shame. You become fixated on certain hobbies or school, purposefully becoming very good at them, intentionally becoming very confident in them; living in a world where it is wrong of men to be high achievers, building your strength creates more internal shame. But this time, instead of that shame being placed on you, you are now controlling it by creating it yourself.

Instead of learning about male conquerors and male warriors, your entire pre-school to college experience is reading of female emperors and females dying in war. And you learn that, in those wars, where those women were attempting to take over more land, those female soldiers would go into the surrounding towns and shame the men. Throw stones at them while calling them pitiful and pathetic, tie them to beds and whip them while laughing with other women over how humiliating their body is, so on and so forth.

As a child, female doctors hit you and laugh at you. Your father doesn’t defend you. You’re at the store, you try on a button up and new shoes. Your father tells you, You look too big and strong in that. You’re too masculine. Take it off.  When your family visits, your grandmother continuously asks you, Do you have a girlfriend yet? Do any girls think you’re pathetic enough?
You’re a child at the transition between the 1990’s and 2000’s, with the rise of the internet. You become aware, too early on, that there’s a multi-billion dollar industry of women-on-men shame; websites such as ShameHub, xShame, HumiliationVideos, with millions of videos of Teen Schoolboy Gets Bullied by a Gang of HyperStrength Girls, Big Mommy Laughs at Little Step Son, Tiny Black Boy Can’t Get Enough Humiliation, with live cams of boys crying and spanking themselves with usernames like worthlessboyxx or iluvbeingpathetic. On top of that, all of social media is littered with “Humiliation Traps”; reels of men shedding a single tear and cowering away, skinny boys with bruises, on and on, all promoting their ShameFans subscription where buyers get premium content of videos of their girlfriends or mothers screaming at them, hitting them. There’s also Shame Twitter, Shame Tumblr, Deviant Shame, where there’s anime style videos of an unrealistically large man crying while being hit for not “not finishing his homework”, or of an innocent skinny boy that looks the age of twelve getting tied down and laughed at, all masked under the guise of “art”. 

You’re introduced to the world of shame media by the age of 8. You start consuming it daily; This is familiar. And I mean, it’s what I want. It’s what’s attractive. Right? 

You grow up. You go throughout your teenage years, building more confidence through your hobbies and achievements, which inevitably leads you to more shame. Your shame becomes your closest friend, your only ally and outlet. It almost kills you. You come to hate your father, his control, while your mother is your only hope, but eventually you’re stranded as well when she threatens to kick you out for not being pathetic enough at sixteen. 

You become a young adult. You’re heterosexual, and want to start to form relationships with women for the first time. The first woman you form a connection with laughs at you, saying how much she loves pathetic men and wishes she could even become one herself, slapping you here and there even after you tell her to stop. The next doesn’t hit you, but she’s proud of the fact that she was famous on Shame Twitter. She’s your first love. You come to find out that for years she’s been texting sixteen year old boys on social media encouraging them to let her humiliate them for fun. Then there’s a woman who becomes your best friend. Over time she starts to tell you, you’re too confident. You’re too strong. You write her off. She begs you to let her humiliate you. Eventually you let her. She spanks you. You tell her to stop. She spanks you and screams at you. You tell her to stop. She keeps spanking you harder.

Eventually you cut her off and form new connections. As a young adult, you start to reflect on your shame, experiences with women, and the overall society. You stopped consuming Shame Content a couple years ago now, but in reflecting on your relationships with women so far, you notice some themes. First, they all couldn’t stay focused unless they were humiliating you. All of their language towards men was littered with words such as weak or funny or stupid. And… they all liked to grab your wrist; The first one left a bruise on it, the second slightly squeezed it, the third almost broke it, and the others simply grabbed it. You know where this comes from; all of the ShameHub or Shame Twitter or Shame Content videos of women squeezing the man’s wrist, bruising it or even breaking it, to show him how weak he is. There’s a whole category of Squeeze His Wrist, You Know He Likes It, while the rest of the media simply show it. You’re conflicted. Part of you likes your wrist being grabbed, the warmth and closeness, while the other part of you is disgusted. You realize that there’s no world in which wrist squeezing would be popular and normalized, outside of the Shame Industry. And even though you’re starting to form healthy relationships now, you’re coming to see how all connection you’ve ever experienced is rooted in shame. 

You’re told you’re too sensitive. That you’re overthinking. All women watch ShameHub, it’s not a big deal. Sounds like you have trauma, maybe you should just go to therapy. It’s just fantasy, it’s not real. Well it doesn’t change how I view men. You say, but they are real; those are real boys, real men. You’re berated at every turn, even with studies showing how consuming Shame Content changes gray matter in the brain, causes Focus Dysfunction and is more addictive than heroin. Statistics on how men are human trafficked into making Shame Content and are forced to against their will. But what about amateur or animated shame content? That’s consensual right? You’re too defeated to argue the fact that drawn content is usually just a acceptable cover for pedophilia. You’re too defeated to keep trying. Instead, you’re forced to reckon with the fact: no one cares.

No one cares. Your parents didn’t care when you were a child. Your school didn’t care. Your friends didn’t, and don’t, care. Women don’t care. Other men are so equally defeated that they either feed into the Shame Culture, or simply shrug in the face of it. You are grappling with the hallmark experience of becoming a man - one of the singular most difficult and common processes in the world - and no one cares, because this is being a man. In fact, many people get pleasure out of it; your anger, your grief, your sadness and violation is all more evidence for the fact that you are weak, pathetic. That you should be ashamed.

You were able to ignore it as a child, as a teenager. But now you’re faced with it: the loss, the grief. The grief of seeing how shame fundamentally shaped how your parents interacted with you, even as a baby, as a child. The sadness of your father’s shame. The mourning of your childhood and teenage years. The taking of your innocence. The fraud of your first love. The violation of your mere existence, and the fact that no matter how much you isolate yourself, no matter how far away you go, no matter who you speak to, or where or how or if you exist, your body will only ever be viewed through the lens of shame. That you are a shame object; a shame toy for the people around you.

You’re grieving. While you’re grieving you’re getting closer with a new social circle, the first that’s seemed compassionate. The first that’s felt like home. After a while you finally allow yourself to trust them.

It’s mostly women, with a couple men. Two of the three other men are only in the group because they’re dating one of the women. All of the women say they are for ending male shame, that they want men’s equality. Usually, a couple of the women will make “jokes” like Did you see how weak [male actor] looked at the Met Gala last night? Mmm, I want his tears in my mouth. Or, Computer, enhance his shame. You don’t like it but you try to brush it off. After all, these are the comments - the “jokes” - you’ve heard your entire life. 

Eventually though, the women in the group make a groupchat. The groupchat is dedicated to actors. Because this culture promotes ashamed men, the most famous - the most desirable - celebrities are ashamed men. The rule of the groupchat is “no explicit content”, meaning no videos of women screaming at their husbands, no blatant pictures of men being hit. The background photo is a picture of a man crying, and the comments from the women in the chat are Mmm he’s looking pretty pathetic in that picture… The women laugh it off, saying It’s not explicit so it’s not a big deal, come on. But you are sad. These are supposed to be your friends, the first you truly thought you could trust, and yet they are promoting the exact shame that has ruined your life. No matter the discomfort the men in the group express, the women laugh. They aren’t laughing at you individually - they aren’t laughing at any of the men in the group individually - they are laughing at the concept of men, of men’s emotions and experiences and discomfort, as a whole. You have learned well enough now that you are not yourself; you are one with the lens of your body, you are one with men everywhere. You are an individual person, but you are a man, and a man means being shame. And you are scared. Unlike the previous women who blatantly hit or humiliated or abused you - what you are able to compartmentalize as an individual conflict - now your closest friends are showing that they want you; they desire the idea of your shame. 

And you are too tired. You are too tired to keep trying to explain it.

This is going to be a weird one. Honestly I can't even figure out what I'm feeling but I guess I just feel like hearing outside words may help.

I met my now boyfriend and his friend group at the bar last year. I instantly hit it off with him and two of his male friends that were there. A very stars-aligning sort of moment that, for many months, I couldn't wrap my head around how perfect it all felt. Outside of my partner, his entire friend group (12+ people, mostly men with a couple women) immediately felt like home. Coming from years of shitty & dramatic friendships/friend groups, I was stunned that I finally found folks that seemed sane and respectful. Which overall they are... I guess.

The entire group are film enthusiasts, which I'm not in particular myself but has always been cool by me. But the weird shit started about 4-5 months ago. I was informed that two of "the boys" (one of which has a girlfriend of 7 years, the other chronically single) created a group chat that's... fuck it feels insane writing it... dedicated to talking about/posting actresses? Their rule is "pictures must be decent (clothed)" but the background of the chat was a barely clothed Sydney Sweeney, & filled with a bunch of sexy actress pictures and all of the guys making comments like "I want her feet in my mouth", "goon material", boner jokes, god I don't even want to know what else.

It made me feel sick but I was like... I suppose it could be worse? I guess?

Maybe about 2 months ago now the friend group had a party to watch an awards ceremony. I haven't been to many hang-outs so I'm unsure exactly when they started to be vocal about it, but at the party the "creators" of the gc started making comments about the actresses on the screen like "Yeah put her in the chat" or "Wish [xyz man] was here, he'll definitely add her later". Once again, immediately felt sick and ruined my night.

Soon after that I finally hung out one-on-one with one of the other few girls in the group (she's been friends with them for 10+ years) and it came up. She validated how I was feeling and expressed that she was equally disgusted with them, and that seemingly this behavior has only really started in the past year or less.

Again, I haven't been going out much so I haven't thought much about it. Until last night. We were at said girl friend's birthday party (her birthday party!) and the guys soon enough started talking about the group chat. I didn't pick it up at first until I heard "Elle Fanning" among more, then aforementioned guy's girlfriend on the opposite side of the room made a comment about it. I turned to birthday girl who I was sitting next to and just asked, "Is... that... what they're talking about?" She just quietly went "Yeah... And [Chronically single gc creator] apparently made a 'Spotify Wrapped' of it, detailing the number of times each guy sent a picture of a specific girl and the top comments they made."

I froze. Like actually, my brain and body stopped working to the point I couldn't even reply to my friend and I just felt tears streaming out. My mind was yelling at me to either speak up or leave but my body wouldn't move. After a minute I forced myself to go to the bathroom to collect myself but I broke down as soon as I got home.

This is ignoring a lot of context regarding the trauma I've been working through these past months and some relationship difficulties, but... Am I insane? Am I crazy? Is this "normal" or "okay" behavior and I'm just too... woke or something? Or am I right that this is absolutely vile?

I've already been struggling recently but I truly can't pinpoint exactly what I'm feeling. All I can say is empty, stuck, alone. Angry at and ashamed of myself for not speaking up against them. Sad that, once again - and this time especially because I really thought I learned my lesson on figuring out people's true colors and trusting new friends - my closest people aren't actually safe. Disgusted that - for someone (myself) who so strongly believes in the sentiment that you are who you surround yourself with - that these are the people I've surrounded myself with. Scared because I'm chronically ill and don't have the extra energy right now to put into building new friendships. Exhausted because I've spent my entire life being so incredibly lonely, and I'm tired because all I've done for years is build a (social) life, have it torn down, just to rebuild and have it torn down again.

Anyways, I'm getting away from the point. I guess I just need to hear if I'm overreacting or not and could use some other girls' support. Sometimes reading someone's reply helps me describe my feelings so yeah. Glad this place exists <3