ID: a picture of TV presenter John Oliver holding his arms wide with a sardonic expression saying, “Welcome to whatever this is...”  The image is surrounded by a gradient rainbow frame.ALT

Welcome to the blog of international bestselling author, Joy Demorra, aka, the Crucifix Nail Nipples Editor.

This is my personal blog where I commit word crimes.

If you’re looking for my chronic illness and disability advocacy posts, or you want to block them (fair), the tag I use is #chronic health tag.

You can also peruse my FAQ.

ID: A promo image showing the two different book covers for Hunger Pangs: True Love Bites side by side. One is blue, one is red. Both show three characters juxtaposed in a bisexual parody of the "distracted boyfriend" meme.   At the top, white text stands out against a purple/blue gradient. It reads: Hunger Pangs: True Love Bites, Book one of the Hunger Pangs Series.  Beneath that it lists qualities of the book: queer paranormal romance, vampire x werewolf, gaslamp fantasy, mutual pining (the love is requited, they're just idiots), slow burn and happily ever after, for now....  The bottom line of text reads: both medium and high heat versions available in eBook, Paperback and Audio.   The image is surrounded by a rainbow gradient frame.ALT

My international bestselling debut romance novel, Hunger Pangs: True Love Bites (Phangs), is out now and available in eBook, Paperback, and Audio.

Set in a pseudo-regency meets fake-Victorian Gaslamp Fantasy world, complete with gothic castles, enchanted forests, and just a smidge of industrial coal dust. Phangs has been described as “like reading the queer, goth love child of Terry Pratchett meets Jane Austen,” and no amount of marketing buzzwords I say can ever top that.

If any of that sparks your interest, you can:

Why are there two versions and what’s the difference between them? Glad you asked! You can also check out individual content tags and heat ratings on my website at www.joydemorra.com

ID: A small tan and white Shih Tzu with dark eyes looking directly into the camera with her tongue hanging out. She looks like a teddy bear.  The image is surrounded by a rainbow gradient frame.ALT

If you’ve seen my dog, Holly Mop, trending around the place and would like to see more of her, her tag is #holly mop. You can also now follow her blog at @holly-mop; we just use it to upload pictures.

Other places you can find me online include: Ao3, Twitter , BlueSky Pillowfort, and Instagram. If you like what I do and would like to see more of it, you can support me on Patreon, Ko-Fi, Payhip, or through my Throne Wishlist.

You can also find me hanging around Twitch on Sundays, where I co-host @theayesphere podcast with @ayeforscotland and sometimes play games. Feel free to come hang out; we’re always happy for new people to natter with.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading and happy scrolling!

Additional image IDs under cut due to length.

Keep reading

pinned posthunger pangs: true love biteschronic health tagholly moplinksalt text provideddescribed
twizzlerheathen asked:

When my TN is flaring up badly, or I throw a kidney stone that gets stuck, I have to pace too. I hope tomorrow isn’t too bad

Ugh, so sorry you know the feeling too. The migraine isn’t gone, so I’m still moving. I’m moving a hell of a lot slower because other parts of me are starting to give out but I’m just… I don’t want the pain that’s waiting for me when I stop.

thebibliosphere
thebibliosphere

brb working out how many steps 8 miles is for someone of my height because this time five years ago, I was so ill I only managed about ten to twenty steps a day before I had to lie down again.

thebibliosphere

23814 steps.

I cannot stress enough that I am going to be in so much pain tomorrow. But that's like *squints*... someone do the math for me. How much of a percentage increase is that?

Because that's a big leap in capability.

thebibliosphere

Responses to this and people going, “What the fuck do you mean you used to do 4 times that when you were healthy?!” in my inbox are making me realize that I’ve likely been answering ADHD questionnaires wrong.

I just never thought about it, y'know? Moving helps me think, that’s just the way I–oh yeah. No, I see the connection now.

Unfortunately, when asked if you present with outward signs of physical hyperactivity, there’s no box to tick that says, “Apparently, I used to zip around like my arse was on fire before my genetic disability metaphorically kneecapped me with a crowbar,” but I’ll take this into consideration, the next time I try to get assessed for meds.

thebibliosphere
thebibliosphere

brb working out how many steps 8 miles is for someone of my height because this time five years ago, I was so ill I only managed about ten to twenty steps a day before I had to lie down again.

thebibliosphere

23814 steps.

I cannot stress enough that I am going to be in so much pain tomorrow. But that’s like *squints*… someone do the math for me. How much of a percentage increase is that?

Because that’s a big leap in capability.

should I have done it? lol haha lmao evenno absolutely notI am going to be in hell tomorrowbut manthat's likea quarter of what I used to do at uniI'm a quarter of a way back to where I was before everything fell apartthat actually makes me so happy

brb working out how many steps 8 miles is for someone of my height because this time five years ago, I was so ill I only managed about ten to twenty steps a day before I had to lie down again.

stormneedle
hellenhighwater

Look if there is absolutely nothing else you take away from the nonsense I am posting, it's this: Make Art.

Make art, with whatever you have. Use scrap cardboard and tape and build something; doodle in your notebooks, make a beautiful dinner, grow a plant, write, paint your nails. Learn to whittle, to knit, to cut straight lines, to sew, to cook, to run at a problem and not solve it the first time. Learn to try again.

Make things the wrong way.

If it works, do it again, better. If it doesn't, do it again, different. Draw badly. Look at the way the light hits something and try to figure out the colors it makes. Watch the way strangers walk and how the weight of them shifts in motion.

Creating art--beautiful things, ugly things, silly things--is not something that you should be leaving to people who are better at it or can afford the expensive materials or have a deep message or whatever. Do it anyway. Do it worse, do it cheaply, do it just for the joy of doing it. The work itself has merit. The work itself is rewarding. Make art.

And pet your cat.

thebibliosphere
thebibliosphere

Reaching the "I want to twist my own head off" phase of this migraine.

At least Ao3 is back up. Small mercies.

thebibliosphere

I spoke too soon. This is the phase of the migraine where I want to twist my head off and the Ao3 servers at going in and out intermittently.

thebibliosphere

One of the fun quirks of my dysautonomia-induced migraines is that occasionally, I turn into a hammerhead shark in that if I stop moving (i.e., I don’t keep my blood pumping via movement), I die the pain gets unbearably worse.

If you’re thinking, “But Joy, doesn’t movement make POTS episodes worse?” you’d be correct, and therein lies the sucker punch of having two (2) different types of dysautonomia fighting for dominance over your nervous system. (*despairing jazz hands*)

Anyway, today was one of those “guess I’ll die” days, and despite being in massive amounts of pain, I couldn’t stop moving because the pain would get worse every time I did, so I just… kept moving.

I just checked my fitness watch out of curiosity, thinking that surely I’d met my 2-mile marker, which is what I try to do every day as part of my physical rehab, and um. I walked 8. I walked 8 miles.

I am going to die tomorrow.

and the worst part is I still have this FUCKING migraine
ao3org
ao3org

We're looking into issues causing site slowness and error pages. Very sorry, will let you know as soon as we know more!

(17:48 UTC March 28, 2024)


We had to restart a database, so the site will continue to be slow or non-responsive as it recovers. Please be gentle with the Archive, and stand by for further updates.

(17:58 UTC March 28, 2024)


Doing the gentlest possible thing to help out our database server: taking the Archive down for a bit. No need to panic, we'll be back as soon as we can!

(18:03 UTC March 28, 2024)

ao3org

We're really sorry this happened just as everyone was getting to the good part. 😔 It might be another couple of hours until all the servers are back in business, so please continue not to panic, and thank you for your kind words so far!

(19:24 UTC March 28, 2024)

ao3org

We're back for now, but still working on getting all servers back on track. There might be more downtime later, so download your current reading material if you can. Thank you so much for your patience!

(21:39 UTC March 28, 2024)

ao3org

The servers that were straggling have got themselves back on track. Thanks again for your patience!

(02:16 UTC March 29, 2024)

naamahdarling
coldalbion

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As a disabled person who's loved LEVERAGE and LEVERAGE REDEMPTION since the beginning - for the characters but also the whole ethos of performing acts that help people against crap systems, it's wonderful to be reminded that it springs from reality.

Reaching the “I want to twist my own head off” phase of this migraine.

At least Ao3 is back up. Small mercies.

a-kind-of-merry-war
a-kind-of-merry-war

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What do you do when you hear your best friend's hand in marriage is the grand prize in a tournament? You steal your brother's armour, cut off all your hair, and enter in disguise to rescue her. Obviously.

All The Painted Stars is a sapphic, medieval romance novel with...

Knight's Tale Vibes
⭐ Women in armour
⭐ Skinny dipping
⭐ Ruining arranged marriages
⭐ The pain of being in love with your best friend

It's OUT NOW wherever books are sold in paperback, ebook and audiobook!

Bookshop.org / Waterstones / Blackwells / Amazon / Kobo

Full blurb & content warnings under the cut.

Keep reading

fantasticwhovian
Anonymous asked:

the chocolate trigger thing is a myth??

baejax-the-great answered:

Thank you for asking. The short of it is yes.

Chocolate as a posited migraine trigger came out of migraine journal studies. Basically, people suffering from migraine were asked to keep detailed journals of their lives, including what they ate, and this was compiled and trends were picked out.

One thing they found? People often ate chocolate before reporting a migraine attack.

There were two things going on here, though it took years for people to come to this conclusion. The first is that migraine prodrome can include sugar cravings– so people who were already well on their way to a migraine attack were craving chocolate, ate the chocolate, and then reported the migraine. The second is that stress is a trigger of both migraines AND sugar cravings. Thus for someone had a rough week, the stress induced both a migraine attack and a desire for chocolate.

Later lab studies in which people who suffer migraine were given chocolate, or cocoa, or small doses of caffeine similar to what’s found in chocolate, etc etc found that there was ZERO evidence for chocolate triggering a migraine. No component of chocolate triggered a migraine in sensitive people, even people who reported chocolate as a trigger.

So really, eating chocolate is a symptom of migraine, not a trigger of it.

These same food diary studies also led scientists to (briefly) believe that alcohol might PREVENT migraines. Why? People who reported fewer migraine attacks drank more alcohol. The actual finding here? People who have more migraine attacks don’t frequently drink alcohol because jfc who wants a drink when they have a migraine (also migraine fucks up social lives). Alcohol, unlike chocolate, DOES trigger migraine attacks.

So these are the kinds of limitations of food diaries when you are trying to figure out what triggers your migraine attacks, and also why doctors emphasizing food triggers, especially chocolate, get a side eye from me.

That said, there is ample evidence that when people feel in control of their health, they tend to feel better. If you believe that chocolate triggers migraine attacks and you feel like limiting chocolate helps you, I’m not going to tell you to stop.

But if your doctor handed you a pamphlet with 20 year out of date information on migraines that included the idea that you had to stop eating chocolate and cheese (no evidence for cheese, either, eat your heart out), I’m here to say your doctor is at least 8 years out of date with the literature.

TLDR; chocolate fine, alcohol bad, doctors lazy, science progresses

fantasticwhovian

@thebibliosphere thought you and your followers might find this interesting

thebibliosphere

That is interesting! And also might explain yesterday’s sweet tooth craving in advance of today’s (unexpected) migraine.

Side note: chocolate and cheese may actually be a migraine trigger for some people with histamine processing issues or some type of mast cell disease, as both chocolate and most cheeses are considered moderately high in histamine or to be histamine liberators.

I don’t have an IgE allergic reaction to either, same with foods like tomatoes or pineapple, but eating them will result in a colossal migraine because of my wonky mast cell response. I get other symptoms too, of course, but migraine is a very common mast cell dysfunction symptom and not one often looked at by migraine researchers. (Understandably. It’s barely looked at by anyone outside of oncologists and immunologists.)

It’s something to do with how histamine affects hypothalamic activity which in turn can affect the severity of migraines.

So yeah, chances are doctors are recommending outdated info that doesn’t quite line up for common migraines, but if you have other symptoms of mast cell dysfunction, the chocolate and cheese could be a trigger due to histamine processing issues. The more you know 🌈⭐️

migrainechronic migraineMCASbodies are weird
thejollywriter
queerslurheritageposts

Queer Slur Heritage Post

princess-mihai

And if we're busy picking which type of gay is most acceptable, that leaves tons of room for bigots to come in and say "this side is right" and watch us tear each other apart. And then they can pretty easily say to the side what won "Well actually you were a little too mean to the other gays so now you die too" all the way until there are no gay people left alive; or that the only ones who are alive are too afraid to go out in public ever again.

Which is

You know

THE BIGOTS' WHOLE PLAN