For the past few days I had my mother and brothers visiting me here in Germany. I guess it was both a weird experience to speak so much Dutch again, and also very normal. It also made me aware of just how much I have been trying to forget about the Netherlands.
Over here in Germany I have been trying to rebuild my life, starting off with almost zero possessions and zero money just a few years ago. I have been painfully aware of just how traumatic my life back in the Netherlands has been.
Aside from the brief interlude of my youth, the confusion and loneliness of trying to understand who I was led up to figuring out that I was intersexed. Instead of a solution and end of confusion the next decade would bring only pain and suffering. From psychological to physical and sexual abuse, psychologists, doctors and others all seemed to conspire against me to make my life a living hell.
This all against the uselessness of the Dutch legal system which failed to protect me when it should have, or understand the plight of intersex and similar minorities. I'm still frankly amazed that I got my official gender changed, even if it was all thanks to German medical results.
While my time here in Germany hasn't been and still isn't easy, it's laughably easy compared to the horror that were the past two decades or so in the Netherlands. I have nothing to thank the Netherlands for. It didn't shelter or protect me. It wasn't there when I needed it the most. Its people may not be mean-spirited, but I can feel nothing but bitter hatred for the country as a whole.
All the help I received inside the Netherlands and outside ultimately only led me to the inevitable conclusion that I had to somehow escape.
Even though I did escape, I clearly did not escape the traumas these experiences left me with. How to trust people again? How to like and love oneself? How to not view life as an endless treadmill of misery and pain until one's inevitable death? My experiences in my country of birth never taught me any of that.
It just taught me how to survive. How to be mean, how to bite back, hide, deaden one's emotions, suppress memories and feelings, and accept being just an unworthy scrap of life in a cold, uncaring society. Thanks to this I still cannot ask for help, nor do I expect that anyone will help me. I expect betrayal and a cold shoulder. To me that's all normal. Just the way life works.
Thus I left. Thus I won't ever go back or forgive the Netherlands for what it did to me. Thus I keep hoping that maybe things can be different as well. That maybe I can be different.
Maya
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Thursday, 19 May 2016
Thursday, 30 June 2011
What I Expect From Australia, Or Please Cut Me Some Slack
Today's post is very much a continuation of Tuesday's blog post (http://mayaposch.blogspot.com/2011/06/why-i-am-leaving-netherlands-forever.html) on my reasons for leaving the Netherlands. As my target country where I am escaping to is Australia, I'll try to outline in this post what my expectations and hopes are.
First of all, I'd like to state my desire to really contribute to Australia, both its economy and its culture. I'm the type of person who likes to give back. My hope is that I'll get what I need to get started from people in Australia as well as its government. This is also one of the sources of my fears. The last thing I would want is to end up all alone in Australia, in a place I can not afford to pay for, with dwindling financial resources and no backup. Notice that I have never known financial security so far, and that the only reason why I haven't ended up on the streets is because I have had family and other people support me, even if it did turn out they had ulterior motives.
Being able to support myself hasn't been an option for a long time because of my struggle to first understand myself, leading to the discovery of my giftedness and my intersexuality, and then against the medical and other parts of the Dutch healthcare system in a futile attempt to get them to help me. Meanwhile I haven't neglected my intellectual side, however. I know various languages, many programming languages, system architectures and basically at least something of every branch of science and technology. My photographic memory and insatiable thirst for knowledge and understanding have been a great boon and still form a major part of who I am and where my interests lie.
Where things get tricky is that I need financial stability in Australia, but thanks to my traumatic experiences in the Netherlands I'll need a recovery period, both for my physical and emotional injuries. My hope is that something can be arranged here, together with some medical treatment. I'd still like a diagnosis of my intersex condition and treatment options. I guess the central theme here is that I require safety and acknowledgement of my physical condition. A stable platform from which to proceed after the dust of migrating has settled.
I will be moving to a completely foreign country after all, where I do not have any friends I have ever met in real-life. At the moment they're just contacts via IRC and email. What I am so terrified of, as I described earlier, is to end up all alone and without support. I would just have fled from a country where the system has actively pushed me towards my death, only to end up in a place where I'll be forced to fight for my survival again. I'd very much like to get a break here. Take away the worries about finances, a place to live etc. for at least a few months until I can get onto my feet.
Above all I require lots of love and attention :) Here in the Netherlands my mother cares a great deal about me, but is helpless on her own to improve my situation. My younger brother, who has been in New Zealand and Australia in 2009, supports me completely as well. Further I have my current beautician who has been very kind to me so far, and a couple of Dutch people I know via IRC who also support me, some of whom are eager to go along with me. I crave for people who will similarly be kind to me, help me where they can and above all make me - a stranger in a strange land - feel welcome.
I hope this rambling post has made some sense to you. It's very hard to put things down when they're mostly emotional in nature. My hope is that the impression it left you with are that I'm an asset to Australia and a good person to have around or even befriend, someone who will repay kindness in kind. The impression it shouldn't have left you with is that of an unstable, homicidal maniac, in which case I probably should rewrite it :)
Maya
First of all, I'd like to state my desire to really contribute to Australia, both its economy and its culture. I'm the type of person who likes to give back. My hope is that I'll get what I need to get started from people in Australia as well as its government. This is also one of the sources of my fears. The last thing I would want is to end up all alone in Australia, in a place I can not afford to pay for, with dwindling financial resources and no backup. Notice that I have never known financial security so far, and that the only reason why I haven't ended up on the streets is because I have had family and other people support me, even if it did turn out they had ulterior motives.
Being able to support myself hasn't been an option for a long time because of my struggle to first understand myself, leading to the discovery of my giftedness and my intersexuality, and then against the medical and other parts of the Dutch healthcare system in a futile attempt to get them to help me. Meanwhile I haven't neglected my intellectual side, however. I know various languages, many programming languages, system architectures and basically at least something of every branch of science and technology. My photographic memory and insatiable thirst for knowledge and understanding have been a great boon and still form a major part of who I am and where my interests lie.
Where things get tricky is that I need financial stability in Australia, but thanks to my traumatic experiences in the Netherlands I'll need a recovery period, both for my physical and emotional injuries. My hope is that something can be arranged here, together with some medical treatment. I'd still like a diagnosis of my intersex condition and treatment options. I guess the central theme here is that I require safety and acknowledgement of my physical condition. A stable platform from which to proceed after the dust of migrating has settled.
I will be moving to a completely foreign country after all, where I do not have any friends I have ever met in real-life. At the moment they're just contacts via IRC and email. What I am so terrified of, as I described earlier, is to end up all alone and without support. I would just have fled from a country where the system has actively pushed me towards my death, only to end up in a place where I'll be forced to fight for my survival again. I'd very much like to get a break here. Take away the worries about finances, a place to live etc. for at least a few months until I can get onto my feet.
Above all I require lots of love and attention :) Here in the Netherlands my mother cares a great deal about me, but is helpless on her own to improve my situation. My younger brother, who has been in New Zealand and Australia in 2009, supports me completely as well. Further I have my current beautician who has been very kind to me so far, and a couple of Dutch people I know via IRC who also support me, some of whom are eager to go along with me. I crave for people who will similarly be kind to me, help me where they can and above all make me - a stranger in a strange land - feel welcome.
I hope this rambling post has made some sense to you. It's very hard to put things down when they're mostly emotional in nature. My hope is that the impression it left you with are that I'm an asset to Australia and a good person to have around or even befriend, someone who will repay kindness in kind. The impression it shouldn't have left you with is that of an unstable, homicidal maniac, in which case I probably should rewrite it :)
Maya
Sunday, 12 June 2011
Love And Warmth; A Sense Of Belonging
This morning I posted the following on my Facebook profile:
"I guess what I long for is to be part of a warm, loving family/group of people. My own family is neither, except for my mother and brothers. Friends I have never had in this country for some reason. I will leave this country with few regrets, hoping to get some of the warmth and love I have never known in my new country."
Yesterday a friend of my mother offered to get me into contact with some family members of her who live in Australia. They're a few years older than me and have been in the Netherlands as well, so they should be able to understand my situation somewhat. A letter was written since this friend of my mother doesn't use a computer let alone internet and therefore doesn't have any email addresses or such things. No problem, it'll just take about a week to get the letter and a couple of my business cards to South-Australia :)
One of the things which terrifies me about migrating is that of ending up in yet another place where I have to fight for everything. My life so far has consisted out of following the path I was supposed to follow until everything derailed after finishing high school and I have been drifting about with a clear sense of where I want to go, but without the ability to get there. Meanwhile everything kept falling apart around me, with my parents divorcing, a number of moves, and of course my run-in with the fantastic healthcare in this country.
There are some parts of my early youth which I fondly remember, but they're few and get scarcer as my memories become more recent until it's all a blur of confusion and pain. The comfort of a loving and warm family and/or group of friends is something I have never truly experienced beyond a few small glimpses.
Part of this is because of my family, both from my father's and mother's side. Neither consists out of very tight or warm families, further illustrated by examples such as that of one of my cousins who committed suicide a number of years ago due to getting abused sexually for many years by an uncle. Now she is dead because she didn't get support from her family or the justice system in this sickening country, and the person responsible is still walking around, free to continue his actions. This is the kind of warmth and loving one can expect in this country and from its inhabitants.
And I'm sick of it.
I am sick of seeing people being unhappy. I am sick of people treating me like I'm some kind of freak. I am sick of having to apologize for my existence. I am sick of having to fight against the urge to end my own life as well because I feel so unwanted by my environment. I am sick of looking back at my life and getting depressed. I am sick of looking at my future and only feeling a bleak sense of despair.
Above all I am sick of being alone in everything.
My dearest wish at this point is to be welcomed in Australia. To have people help me get settled. To have a fun job there. To not have to explain my situation every time I have to show my ID. To have people help me with my intersex condition. To have friends with whom I can play videogames, work on projects or just have fun. To feel a part of a loving, warm group of people who genuinely care about me.
I like to think that I am a gentle, caring and sensitive person who only wants herself and others to be happy. So far this attitude towards life has just resulted in getting punished at every turn. Not understanding why being a good person gets me punished all the time is the main reason why I am having difficulty with hanging on to life. I mean, if just being myself is not accepted by my surroundings, then why would I keep trying?
In a sense everything at the moment comes down to the choice between staying here in this cold, unforgiving, intolerant and above all heavily prejudiced Netherlands and most likely die a tragic death at my own hands, or take a gamble, move to Australia and hope for the best.
All I hope for is that being a kind, intelligent and skilled person is enough to help me survive over there.
Please let it be true...
Maya
"I guess what I long for is to be part of a warm, loving family/group of people. My own family is neither, except for my mother and brothers. Friends I have never had in this country for some reason. I will leave this country with few regrets, hoping to get some of the warmth and love I have never known in my new country."
Yesterday a friend of my mother offered to get me into contact with some family members of her who live in Australia. They're a few years older than me and have been in the Netherlands as well, so they should be able to understand my situation somewhat. A letter was written since this friend of my mother doesn't use a computer let alone internet and therefore doesn't have any email addresses or such things. No problem, it'll just take about a week to get the letter and a couple of my business cards to South-Australia :)
One of the things which terrifies me about migrating is that of ending up in yet another place where I have to fight for everything. My life so far has consisted out of following the path I was supposed to follow until everything derailed after finishing high school and I have been drifting about with a clear sense of where I want to go, but without the ability to get there. Meanwhile everything kept falling apart around me, with my parents divorcing, a number of moves, and of course my run-in with the fantastic healthcare in this country.
There are some parts of my early youth which I fondly remember, but they're few and get scarcer as my memories become more recent until it's all a blur of confusion and pain. The comfort of a loving and warm family and/or group of friends is something I have never truly experienced beyond a few small glimpses.
Part of this is because of my family, both from my father's and mother's side. Neither consists out of very tight or warm families, further illustrated by examples such as that of one of my cousins who committed suicide a number of years ago due to getting abused sexually for many years by an uncle. Now she is dead because she didn't get support from her family or the justice system in this sickening country, and the person responsible is still walking around, free to continue his actions. This is the kind of warmth and loving one can expect in this country and from its inhabitants.
And I'm sick of it.
I am sick of seeing people being unhappy. I am sick of people treating me like I'm some kind of freak. I am sick of having to apologize for my existence. I am sick of having to fight against the urge to end my own life as well because I feel so unwanted by my environment. I am sick of looking back at my life and getting depressed. I am sick of looking at my future and only feeling a bleak sense of despair.
Above all I am sick of being alone in everything.
My dearest wish at this point is to be welcomed in Australia. To have people help me get settled. To have a fun job there. To not have to explain my situation every time I have to show my ID. To have people help me with my intersex condition. To have friends with whom I can play videogames, work on projects or just have fun. To feel a part of a loving, warm group of people who genuinely care about me.
I like to think that I am a gentle, caring and sensitive person who only wants herself and others to be happy. So far this attitude towards life has just resulted in getting punished at every turn. Not understanding why being a good person gets me punished all the time is the main reason why I am having difficulty with hanging on to life. I mean, if just being myself is not accepted by my surroundings, then why would I keep trying?
In a sense everything at the moment comes down to the choice between staying here in this cold, unforgiving, intolerant and above all heavily prejudiced Netherlands and most likely die a tragic death at my own hands, or take a gamble, move to Australia and hope for the best.
All I hope for is that being a kind, intelligent and skilled person is enough to help me survive over there.
Please let it be true...
Maya
Sunday, 5 September 2010
Birthday
Yesterday was my birthday. For a change I didn't really feel that depressed or anything at all about it. What I did worry about a bit was having this new friend - the English student, if I mentioned her before - over for the weekend; thanks to previous and virtually all bad or at least terribly confusing meetings like this I was feeling most definitely apprehensive about it. As it turns out, this feeling was totally unwarranted.
On Saturday I first got my birthday gifts from Pieter: a Hello Kitty plushie and keyring as well as a new hairdryer. What can I say? I'm a sucker for cute stuff :) Pieter and I did groceries as usual, dropped off a package at the post office and returned home where I had time for a quick breakfast. At close to 11 AM I had to catch a train to Amsterdam where I met up with this English student and my mother, the latter having asked me to meet her there as it would be more convenient for her. This would be the second time I would meet this student.
After a bit of logistics we finally met up at the train station where the student gave me her birthday gift: a CD featuring music by her and another girl. After waiting for a bit - my mom's train was supposed to arrive at 11.32, but this turned out to be 11.38 for some reason - but eventually we found each other as well. My mom really wanted to meet this new friend of mine, so she finally got the chance.
We went to a little cafe some distance away from the station where we had a drink. My mom gave me this heart I could write a message on, a pair of luxurious chopsticks and some money. What puzzled me a bit was that when the student was away for a moment my mom said to me "Well done finding this girl." or something to that effect. I wasn't sure what to think of that. I actually still don't :)
Anyway, my mom got picked up by a friend of her while the student and I went back to her place to pick up some things she would need, like a swimsuit. We walked both ways through the streets and parks of Amsterdam, which was made very pleasant by the fine weather. Eventually we returned to the train station and caught the first train back to Almere.
Once back home we had cake, drinks and tea, then watched a movie (Spaceballs, a classic), had dinner (Chinese take-out, yum) and the student and I took a walk, then watched another movie together (Secret Window, an okay movie based on a book by Stephen King). After that she was pretty much nodding off already, so we decided to go to bed early.
For me this was the first time I really did the 'pillow talk' thing; talking about mostly girl stuff with another girl. I must say that it is pretty fun ^_^ It's times like that when I miss not having had any female friends before. Actually falling asleep was more difficult for me, with PTSD flashbacks keeping me awake. Eventually I did manage, but I have no idea whether I slept more than a few hours at most. The student had no such issues, though :P
After getting up we had to rush to make it to the pool, where we had a fun time. The student got a chance to socialize a bit with my other friends/Pieter's friends, while I caught up with some people I hadn't seen or spoken to since the summer vacation started. This was pretty fun, especially to see those Chinese girls and their mother again. They seemed very energetic today and when they saw me they called out my name, asking me to join them. I love children like them :)
A few hours after we got back from the pool the student had to leave for an appointment. I took a nap soon after that, as I felt pretty tired. Waking up from it, I felt rested but also kind of lonely. It's easy to get used to the presence of fun people :) I'm really glad I met a friend like her: someone who is fun to talk to, mostly sane and likes to have in-depth talks on the finer points of life and everything. It's something I used to do a lot with my mom a few years ago, and it's fun to do it again but this time with someone my age.
All in all, not a bad birthday, and I think those long talks with this student are really changing me. It certainly beats visiting a shrink ;) I also like discussing such matters in English instead of Dutch, due to the former being so much more expressive. I'm having some difficulty at the moment switching back to talking Dutch again, as I seem to have a strong preference for English. Fortunately not many people get to hear me talk in Dutch :P
Maya
On Saturday I first got my birthday gifts from Pieter: a Hello Kitty plushie and keyring as well as a new hairdryer. What can I say? I'm a sucker for cute stuff :) Pieter and I did groceries as usual, dropped off a package at the post office and returned home where I had time for a quick breakfast. At close to 11 AM I had to catch a train to Amsterdam where I met up with this English student and my mother, the latter having asked me to meet her there as it would be more convenient for her. This would be the second time I would meet this student.
After a bit of logistics we finally met up at the train station where the student gave me her birthday gift: a CD featuring music by her and another girl. After waiting for a bit - my mom's train was supposed to arrive at 11.32, but this turned out to be 11.38 for some reason - but eventually we found each other as well. My mom really wanted to meet this new friend of mine, so she finally got the chance.
We went to a little cafe some distance away from the station where we had a drink. My mom gave me this heart I could write a message on, a pair of luxurious chopsticks and some money. What puzzled me a bit was that when the student was away for a moment my mom said to me "Well done finding this girl." or something to that effect. I wasn't sure what to think of that. I actually still don't :)
Anyway, my mom got picked up by a friend of her while the student and I went back to her place to pick up some things she would need, like a swimsuit. We walked both ways through the streets and parks of Amsterdam, which was made very pleasant by the fine weather. Eventually we returned to the train station and caught the first train back to Almere.
Once back home we had cake, drinks and tea, then watched a movie (Spaceballs, a classic), had dinner (Chinese take-out, yum) and the student and I took a walk, then watched another movie together (Secret Window, an okay movie based on a book by Stephen King). After that she was pretty much nodding off already, so we decided to go to bed early.
For me this was the first time I really did the 'pillow talk' thing; talking about mostly girl stuff with another girl. I must say that it is pretty fun ^_^ It's times like that when I miss not having had any female friends before. Actually falling asleep was more difficult for me, with PTSD flashbacks keeping me awake. Eventually I did manage, but I have no idea whether I slept more than a few hours at most. The student had no such issues, though :P
After getting up we had to rush to make it to the pool, where we had a fun time. The student got a chance to socialize a bit with my other friends/Pieter's friends, while I caught up with some people I hadn't seen or spoken to since the summer vacation started. This was pretty fun, especially to see those Chinese girls and their mother again. They seemed very energetic today and when they saw me they called out my name, asking me to join them. I love children like them :)
A few hours after we got back from the pool the student had to leave for an appointment. I took a nap soon after that, as I felt pretty tired. Waking up from it, I felt rested but also kind of lonely. It's easy to get used to the presence of fun people :) I'm really glad I met a friend like her: someone who is fun to talk to, mostly sane and likes to have in-depth talks on the finer points of life and everything. It's something I used to do a lot with my mom a few years ago, and it's fun to do it again but this time with someone my age.
All in all, not a bad birthday, and I think those long talks with this student are really changing me. It certainly beats visiting a shrink ;) I also like discussing such matters in English instead of Dutch, due to the former being so much more expressive. I'm having some difficulty at the moment switching back to talking Dutch again, as I seem to have a strong preference for English. Fortunately not many people get to hear me talk in Dutch :P
Maya
Saturday, 5 September 2009
Birthday Party
Yesterday was my 26th birthday. It was unexpectedly busy, with my older brother and his girlfriend present as well. It was definitely more of a birthday than the previous ten or so. I also got a lot of presents, including a second swimsuit from Pieter, a cat-themed birthday calendar and cups, plus some really nice shirts. Pictures will follow.
It was the first time meeting my brother's girlfriend. She had been wanting to meet me for a while as well. We did talk a lot, also a few times just the two of us. As usual, she ended up messing with my hair and such as girls always seem to do with me :P she braided my hair and will teach me how to braid my hair plus other things some other time. My brother and Pieter nearly ran away screaming when they saw three women busy with 'girly' stuff. I guess it's a weakness common to males :P
The past week hasn't been very good for me, though, probably due to the new Estradiol patches. Sunday started with the migraine attack and the days after that I have had almost a constant headache, preventing my sleeping pill from working last night. Yesterday and today I also found myself suffering from motion sickness while in a car, something I haven't really experienced in over a decade. I also experience waves of nausea the past few days.
After a week of this it seems fairly clear to me that the patches just aren't working for me, as I seem to be hitting bullseyes on quite a few of the side-effects. Yesterday the patch I was wearing also fell off (second day), despite my best attempts to properly put it on. In terms of wearing comfort, ease of use and side-effects it can be pretty much called a disaster. I'll therefore go back to the oral medication starting tomorrow and make an appointment with my GP.
I'll ask my GP to prescribe the estradiol gel, assuming they have the brands I found (Sandrena, in sachet form, and Estrodose/Oestrogel, tube form). The dose to use is 1 milligram a day, similar to the patches, which have 4 mg per patch for four days. I then hope that the side-effects with the gel will be a lot more mild, as what I'm currently experiencing is simply ridiculous.
Please, don't let me get another migraine attack tomorrow... :(
Maya
It was the first time meeting my brother's girlfriend. She had been wanting to meet me for a while as well. We did talk a lot, also a few times just the two of us. As usual, she ended up messing with my hair and such as girls always seem to do with me :P she braided my hair and will teach me how to braid my hair plus other things some other time. My brother and Pieter nearly ran away screaming when they saw three women busy with 'girly' stuff. I guess it's a weakness common to males :P
The past week hasn't been very good for me, though, probably due to the new Estradiol patches. Sunday started with the migraine attack and the days after that I have had almost a constant headache, preventing my sleeping pill from working last night. Yesterday and today I also found myself suffering from motion sickness while in a car, something I haven't really experienced in over a decade. I also experience waves of nausea the past few days.
After a week of this it seems fairly clear to me that the patches just aren't working for me, as I seem to be hitting bullseyes on quite a few of the side-effects. Yesterday the patch I was wearing also fell off (second day), despite my best attempts to properly put it on. In terms of wearing comfort, ease of use and side-effects it can be pretty much called a disaster. I'll therefore go back to the oral medication starting tomorrow and make an appointment with my GP.
I'll ask my GP to prescribe the estradiol gel, assuming they have the brands I found (Sandrena, in sachet form, and Estrodose/Oestrogel, tube form). The dose to use is 1 milligram a day, similar to the patches, which have 4 mg per patch for four days. I then hope that the side-effects with the gel will be a lot more mild, as what I'm currently experiencing is simply ridiculous.
Please, don't let me get another migraine attack tomorrow... :(
Maya
Friday, 26 June 2009
Exposure
After Tuesday a lot happened, and didn't happen. On Wednesday I didn't do much at all, just tried to work and doing a fair job of it. Thursday, however, something happened to me.
While I was waiting for my appointment at the beauty salon to get zapped (hair-removal), I noticed a few times that the room was spinning. Then after the treatment was finished, I felt dizzy again the moment I stood up. I didn't think too much of it at that moment. However, when I returned home and after finishing lunch I began to crash. I have never felt more tired, more detached, more weary of everything. All I wanted was to sleep, shut out everything. The rest of that day I spent largely in bed.
Today I was supposed to go to my appointment with my therapist, Engel Vrouwe. Yet moments after getting out of bed I felt the same sense of incredible weariness invading me again, with the same stabbing pains throughout my body and an inability to muster the strength for any task, no matter how small. As it didn't fade, I informed Engel Vrouwe that I would not be able to make it to the appointment. He later called me to tell me that while he would have liked to have seen me, it wasn't crucial.
He also told me that he had been in contact with my insurance company on the matter of the chimera test, and is now waiting on a certain person to call him back. We also made a new appointment on June the 30th, Tuesday, at the house of a female colleague of Engel Vrouwe. He may be present there himself as well, but it isn't certain yet. For now I'll just have to see that I can shake off this weariness before then.
So today I have mostly just been lying on bed, reading and sleeping. I intend to take things really easy the coming days, skipping the party of my grandfather and everything. It may just be that the exhaustion I already experienced due to stress has been worsened by the warm weather, kicking me over the edge.
Anyway, something I did do the past days was compile the irregularities in my case and making a nice document out of it, including some MRI images. It is available in HTML and PDF form at www.mayaposch.com/irregularities.php, and also linked to on my main site from the 'about me' page. I have shown it to people already, but not really received many comments on it yet. Most interesting talk on it was with a British friend of mine who is also a chimera. He was able to tell me about when they performed the chimera test on him. Quite interesting.
Maya
While I was waiting for my appointment at the beauty salon to get zapped (hair-removal), I noticed a few times that the room was spinning. Then after the treatment was finished, I felt dizzy again the moment I stood up. I didn't think too much of it at that moment. However, when I returned home and after finishing lunch I began to crash. I have never felt more tired, more detached, more weary of everything. All I wanted was to sleep, shut out everything. The rest of that day I spent largely in bed.
Today I was supposed to go to my appointment with my therapist, Engel Vrouwe. Yet moments after getting out of bed I felt the same sense of incredible weariness invading me again, with the same stabbing pains throughout my body and an inability to muster the strength for any task, no matter how small. As it didn't fade, I informed Engel Vrouwe that I would not be able to make it to the appointment. He later called me to tell me that while he would have liked to have seen me, it wasn't crucial.
He also told me that he had been in contact with my insurance company on the matter of the chimera test, and is now waiting on a certain person to call him back. We also made a new appointment on June the 30th, Tuesday, at the house of a female colleague of Engel Vrouwe. He may be present there himself as well, but it isn't certain yet. For now I'll just have to see that I can shake off this weariness before then.
So today I have mostly just been lying on bed, reading and sleeping. I intend to take things really easy the coming days, skipping the party of my grandfather and everything. It may just be that the exhaustion I already experienced due to stress has been worsened by the warm weather, kicking me over the edge.
Anyway, something I did do the past days was compile the irregularities in my case and making a nice document out of it, including some MRI images. It is available in HTML and PDF form at www.mayaposch.com/irregularities.php, and also linked to on my main site from the 'about me' page. I have shown it to people already, but not really received many comments on it yet. Most interesting talk on it was with a British friend of mine who is also a chimera. He was able to tell me about when they performed the chimera test on him. Quite interesting.
Maya
Tuesday, 23 June 2009
TV Star
This morning I had my intake appointment at De Meregaard. I explained my situation and my intention to get treatment from a therapist due to a psychiatrist not being able to request medical tests. Both doctor Temmerman (quite nice guy) and psychiatrist Oostveen understood this and I'm now waiting on a response from Engel Vrouwe regarding an appointment with him or his colleague. I also sent an email to my insurance company regarding compensation for travel expenses, since I'll have to spend around 25 Euro a trip to the therapist.
A funny thing happened when I was walking back to the train station: on the parking lot of a nearby supermarket there was this car with the engine running and two guys inside it. The one at my side had his window down. When I was walking past them on the sidewalk, he said "Hey, sexy.", after which I just smiled and kept walking. I was wearing a short skirt today, low-cut top and some make-up. Apparently I wasn't looking too bad :P
Anyway, at my arrival home I sent the aforementioned emails and prepared a combined breakfast/lunch which I consumed while watching another episode of Saishuuheiki Kanojo ("She, the ultimate weapon"), one of my all-time favourite anime series. This is the second time I'm watching this series, yet I feel that it evokes a powerful emotional response in me, at least as strong as the first time I watched it. There's an edge of seriousness, of relentlessness to this series which makes it impossible to just watch casually.
After brunch I did some research on handling endianness in a network protocol I'm developing. It's definitely not as easy a subject as it may appear at first glance, there are a lot of arbitrary design decisions to be made, such as whether to use big- or small-endian format (most significant (highest value) bits first or last). Definitely interesting. Around 3 PM I took another 2-hour nap and woke up in time to greet Pieter who returned home.
Before Pieter returned from his work I got a few emails in my inbox, one about the arcade cabinet I have been trying to sell for Pieter for a while now. This guy turned out to be from Belgium, though, and he might not be able to pick up the cabinet until December. So yeah.
The other email was from Omroep Flevoland, the TV channel I was featured on during their news show last year. The email was from the person in charge of a kind of documentary show called 'Vrije Vogels', and in it he wrote that he'd like to have me on that show, which would involve them tracking me for a day to see what kind of person I am. I agreed to cooperating with it. Within 2 weeks I'll receive more details about everything.
Finally, I just made an appointment with Engel Vrouwe for Friday, June 26th, 1.30 PM. It'll be a grueling 3+ hour trip to and from the small town near Leeuwarden where he lives due to me not having access to a car. At least I don't have to pay the full price for my train ticket (40% off). It's still a painful 25 Euro for a roundtrip, though. Let's hope that the request form I sent in Saturday for the Bbz welfare check is accepted soon.
Tomorrow I have nothing scheduled, just regular work, Thursday I get zapped by a laser again (I really need to ask how much longer this treatment is going to take :( ), and Friday I have the appointment with Engel Vrouwe, which will end up taking the entire day (7 hours travel, 2 hours talking). I'll leave home at 10 AM, arrive at my destination at 1.25 PM, talk until 3.30 PM, then travel back to arrive home at around 7-8 PM. Anyone care to give me a ride in his/her car? ^_^;;
It's a bit of a shame that I'll be traveling for so long, since my grandfather has his birthday on Saturday, and I doubt I'll be in the mood to do anything that day after Friday :( It's been over 1.5 years since I have last seen many of the family members who will be present at my grandfather's birthday, and nearly a year since I last saw my grandparents.
Maya
A funny thing happened when I was walking back to the train station: on the parking lot of a nearby supermarket there was this car with the engine running and two guys inside it. The one at my side had his window down. When I was walking past them on the sidewalk, he said "Hey, sexy.", after which I just smiled and kept walking. I was wearing a short skirt today, low-cut top and some make-up. Apparently I wasn't looking too bad :P
Anyway, at my arrival home I sent the aforementioned emails and prepared a combined breakfast/lunch which I consumed while watching another episode of Saishuuheiki Kanojo ("She, the ultimate weapon"), one of my all-time favourite anime series. This is the second time I'm watching this series, yet I feel that it evokes a powerful emotional response in me, at least as strong as the first time I watched it. There's an edge of seriousness, of relentlessness to this series which makes it impossible to just watch casually.
After brunch I did some research on handling endianness in a network protocol I'm developing. It's definitely not as easy a subject as it may appear at first glance, there are a lot of arbitrary design decisions to be made, such as whether to use big- or small-endian format (most significant (highest value) bits first or last). Definitely interesting. Around 3 PM I took another 2-hour nap and woke up in time to greet Pieter who returned home.
Before Pieter returned from his work I got a few emails in my inbox, one about the arcade cabinet I have been trying to sell for Pieter for a while now. This guy turned out to be from Belgium, though, and he might not be able to pick up the cabinet until December. So yeah.
The other email was from Omroep Flevoland, the TV channel I was featured on during their news show last year. The email was from the person in charge of a kind of documentary show called 'Vrije Vogels', and in it he wrote that he'd like to have me on that show, which would involve them tracking me for a day to see what kind of person I am. I agreed to cooperating with it. Within 2 weeks I'll receive more details about everything.
Finally, I just made an appointment with Engel Vrouwe for Friday, June 26th, 1.30 PM. It'll be a grueling 3+ hour trip to and from the small town near Leeuwarden where he lives due to me not having access to a car. At least I don't have to pay the full price for my train ticket (40% off). It's still a painful 25 Euro for a roundtrip, though. Let's hope that the request form I sent in Saturday for the Bbz welfare check is accepted soon.
Tomorrow I have nothing scheduled, just regular work, Thursday I get zapped by a laser again (I really need to ask how much longer this treatment is going to take :( ), and Friday I have the appointment with Engel Vrouwe, which will end up taking the entire day (7 hours travel, 2 hours talking). I'll leave home at 10 AM, arrive at my destination at 1.25 PM, talk until 3.30 PM, then travel back to arrive home at around 7-8 PM. Anyone care to give me a ride in his/her car? ^_^;;
It's a bit of a shame that I'll be traveling for so long, since my grandfather has his birthday on Saturday, and I doubt I'll be in the mood to do anything that day after Friday :( It's been over 1.5 years since I have last seen many of the family members who will be present at my grandfather's birthday, and nearly a year since I last saw my grandparents.
Maya
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