Posts made by kk

And then another thing has me stressed is the vaccinaed vs unvacccinated.

Again don't want to get into the right/left politics if possible.

But there are people going...oh we should not give medical care to anyone who isn't vaccinated. I am no we should give medical care to everyone who needs it. And there are people cheering when unvaccinated people die. And I feel like cheering on people dieing and suffering is messed up.

Then on the other side, I have people going the vaccine is a weapon of genocide and you are all going to die and should quit your jobs before you take it. And when they here someone vaccinated is sick, they are cheering it on. It feel ill that people are wanting the vaccinated to die in order to prove a point.

And it is making me so so anxious and depressed to hear this. I don't think its right to cheer about anyone getting sick with covid and suffering, regardless of their vaccine status.

The world is broken.

So I did 5 days straight and was all stressed out. I am getting more effected by stress at work than I was last winter. Our staffing shortage is much worse. Our covid rates were I am are real low though so that is good. But just the stress of endlessly being short staffed and working so much. I think to there was like a rush that gave me energy to work alot and with that rush fading, but the need not fading, there is an exhaustion. I am not alone in this, lots of the nurses and nurse's aids I work with report the same. Some are leaving the medical field over it.

While I understand the reason for the vaccine mandate and absolutely have no desire to get into the politics of such, so I vote we don't go there. And I am not arguing against such.

I am stressed because some of the nurses were I work are going to leave over mandates and our staffing is about to get worse. Many are agency nurses and now the whole country will be fighting for agency nurses as the number of them gets even lower. I am fully vaccinated and plan to stay nursing and to follow any vaccine mandates. But what is going down the line in turns of nursing shortages has me pretty frightened for my patients, for my workplace for the whole country and for myself.

My anxiety is super high and has been also effecting my mushing.

I have 3 days off straight and I need them so bad. I got asked to come today and I said no. I don't normally say no. But I just can't keep going and going, coming in all the time. I already did like 60 hours. I don't need to over 70 hours right now.

But on the other hand I feel sort of gulity too, like they really need me. So I feel bad for saying no and yet I feel like I have to pace myself if I am going to make through this coming storm. This fall and winter are going to be a shit show.

I don't want to spam the other boards, talking about pandemic issues all the time, so I made a new thread! I realize I spam the ooc boards a bit and apreciate all who read. Oddly at times MSB can be like a safe space to express some feelings. Sometimes it is a bit like like journeling where others can read. I think the mushing community is often very suportive abou real life issues. Sometimes even mushers who dont get along over games are supportive when it comes to real life troubles, which is great.

Anyways so I made a board for us to talk specifically about our pandemic issues, be it having covid, family with covid, job situations in the pandemic and etc.

But I also though by seperating if anyone is sick of hearing about it or burnt out on pandemic talk, they are can just not read the thread.

I don't toe walk, but I stim. Stiming is to me something that can be soothing, calming or even joyful. But it is something that looks really crazy and odd to others. So I learned to mostly do it at home. When I was a child, I would stim out in public and that was something that marked me as being very different and not okay. While there there are many different ways to stim, I tend to bounce around hyperly in a sort of circle listening to the same song again and again or rapidly rub my legs over and over again. The rubbing I do when I am anxious to calm and the hoping is like a joyful rush of sensory fun.

One time I was in a happy mood and at a gathering with my then boyfriend and his friends and were outside and without even thinking about it or realizing what I was doing, I just starting hummin and hoping and bouncing about hyperly while flapping my hands and stuff. They all though I was crazy and I still feel embarassed of that to this day. I didn't know what I was doing until it had already been a few moments.

Then more recently while at work, I had this super super stressful day. I was in the middle of working 5 days straight (12--14 hour days straight), two nurses called off and everything was a mess. I go into the nursing station and start frantically rubbing my legs once I got things taken care of enough to have a moment to do that. It was soothing and I didn't even realizing I was doing it. And another nurse walks in and looks at me like wtf. I am dealing with feeling ashamed of that right now. I don't think there is anything wrong with stiming, but I know it looks werid to people and I try to keep it inside my house or at least in my own yard.

I shoud stop spamming this board, but one more point!

There is alot about autism that is very wonderful.

My hoping and bouncing around hyperly while listening to the same song again and again, is considered and autistic trait.

But it is also a super fun autistic trait!

Everyone should hop hyperly around while listening to /Its raining tacos/ over and over again! You won't believe how fun it is to stim!

I also want to say this to parents with kids with autism.

The experts are not always right about it. They will say things like this child is low funcitoning and will never be able to xyz. They are often wrong. Autism is deeply complicated and many people on the spectrum understand more than many realize and will make sudden leaps forward.

I am not saying that if someone has a low funcinting autism child they will for sure reach the point of being able to care for themselves and work - but I am saying it is much more possible than many experts will lead one to believe. And that nobody really knows what their future will bring.

I was considered by /experts/ to be basically mentally retarded because I couldn't outwardly express myself in a way they could understand. But I did feel alot of pain and hurt, realizing that people were not able to understand me and believed I was dumb. I was grasping more than they realized.

So I def urge not to give up hope and to understand that many autistic children are more growing and learning differently and at a different pace, but that doesn't mean there is anything wrong with them.

I used to write really badly when I mushed. So much so that people would ask me if I was English as a second lang and not always believe when when I said, I wasn't!

I started to mush before I went through nursing school and I think that mushing actually helped to get my understanding of the written word high enough where I could make it through said program.

Mushing has been overall good for me and helpful. I meant lots of understanding and wonderful people. I learned alot about language and the meaning behind words and etc. I came a long way in my understanding of words since I started to mush.

When I am really exhausted or babbling in ooc talks, my typing and word use sometimes get really really bad. Some of you have seen and tried to patiently read through it! Thank you.

I have had bad moments though in mushing where it was not the best for me, where I was taking it to seriously and getting too insecure. If that was autism or just me, who knows.

One could even argue I am not really autistic, but am instead developementally disabled or learning disabled around language. But I don't think the terms don't matter exactly. We all have our issues to overcome and differences.

I do find it interesting that some people with autism are hyperlexic. It seems that maybe autism can cause extremes in both directions. It is fascinating.

I was diagonosised with autism when I was about 9 years old by the school system. I couldn't read at all until I was about 12. I still can barely write out things by hand, but my eye hand coordination is fine when not writing stuff out by hand. (I can sew, but not write!) I am also dyslexic and have dysgraphia which is part of that. I was non-verbal until I was about 5 years old. My mom was told that I would never reach the point where I would be able to live on my own and would need to be under her care or in a facility for the rest of my life. I have speech problem as well.

As a child most thought I was super dumb - I couldn't talk at all and then couldn't speak right. Then I couldn't read or write.

Eventually I reached the point of becoming very high functioning on the spectrum to the point where many who meet/know me in real life do not know. I didn't finish high school, but got my GED and did an RN program at a community college and now work without anyone noticing I am disabled. I didn't get special help through the RN program, but it was harder for me than many others.

Despite severe autism symptoms and being /low functioning/ in early childhood it took me a long time and being in the public school system to get diagnosied. That is likely largely because I am a female from a background of proverty. I didn't get the fancy therapies and etc.

Some say' especially who meet me online where I can be super chatty, that I don't seem autistic at all and even will doubt it is true. Is it true? Was a misdiganosised. I don't even know.

One thing I will say is that autism often looks different in females than men. Not all autistic people have all autistic traits. While I do have some social difficulities, my autism was more about severe around language written and verbal than anything.

I believe very strongly though that autism should not be used as excuse for bad behavior in real life and online. It is why when I socially fucked up in mushing, I didn't go, but I am autistic!! We are all responsible for our own behaviors and nobody is fully neurologically normal.

We also all develope at different rates. I didn't mean the childhood milestones at the right time, but I am well functioning now.

Getting to this exhausted burn out phase in pandemic era nursing where the adrenal rush is not there any more and it just feels like this never ending marathon that never ends, but just goes on with an ever increasing steeper incline.

The nursing/nursing aid shortage is worse than ever and about to get much worse with winter, holidays, covid and the vaccine mandate. It worse than it was last winter by far and not even winter yet.

And I am so super fatigued and don't have the burst of, emerency energy zoomzoom that I did last winter. Many nurses I work with and know feel the same. It is getting harder and harder to continue at this pace. Tempers are short and we are stressed.

And my air coniditor broke when its been 90! so hoooottttt.

I am having a hard time adjusting to the pandemic being over. That might sound odd or maybe it doesn't sound so odd, I don't know how other people feel on this all.

I go places and see all these people without masks and get a bit nervous, maybe more than a bit. I put my mask even though I am fully vaccinated. I feel confused as strangers will get near to me while I am in my scrubs. Even the roads being filled to cars, feels more unreal than when they were empty.

I was convinced a few weeks back, we had a few rogue positive covid tests, that we had a variant in the building and the pandemic would all start a new and be vaccine resistant. I was terrified of that, but also resigned and ready to fight the next the battle in werid sort of way. I feel like I am just waiting for the next crisis to hit and can't stop the waiting. I don't even want to take my mask off when places say no mask required.

Us all testing negative and the state saying patient's don't even need to mask in the builiding anymore and life going back to normal has me feeling strangely a bit numb and confused. I should be happy and I kind of am. But I am kind of lost too. Things going back to normal feels surreal.

I find myself shifting between fearing a variant, being happy life is back to normal and feeling like...well it is hard to explain sort of shell shocked, not that I have the time to take a breath and be shellshocked. I lost several wonderful patients and I find myself thinking about them, long after other people in the building seemed to have moved on. I find myself reliving my own epperience of almost having a covid stroke and like...I almost died and I didn't even get that then. I was in the rush to get back to work while still short of breath, that seems sort of extreme now that I think about that. I am like was that really me?

I find it werid to see people gathering without masks and moving on and while I am glad that people are and happy about it, I sort of feel like I might never move on. I am not sure I even want to move on. It feels almost disrespectful to move on. I still cry over people who died. I cry over them more now than I did in the midst of things, I didn't have time to in the midst of things, but now it is really hitting me.

I am not fully sure how to move on. I feel like life will never be back to normal or back to the way it was before.

I was begged to be a middle nursing manager at my job and I was like absolutely not! I always use the line...

"I make a better warrior than a general."

There are a few reasons why and one is that I am just not a manager type of personality. Another is that I prefer direct patient care over paperwork. I would rather be on the floor caring for patient's directly than at a desk charting.

But there is the squeeze of middle managers too, they get pressure from above them and pressure from below them and don't have enough power to really change things.

Plus I wouldn't really make that much more and as a floor nurse, I have more abilitty to decide what extra shifts I work. I do work alot of extra, but as a non manager, I can say no if I reach that burn out point. And I feel like it is coming. I am so exhausted. I am considering just working 40 hours a week in June.

@tinuviel

I just looked it up and you are right. Apparently in the US this was happening as recent as the 70s. Very depressing and heartbreaking.

While I am aware there are many bad parents out there.....

I would have zero desire to live in a society where we are taking away children at birth from their mother's because they are not approved by the state to be mother's ahead of time or where we are forcing people who are not approved by the state to have surgery even if it can later be reversed.

If we think the same middle aged white women approving people for pet adoptions is a problem, imagine the problems if the same middle aged white women are deciding who gets to have children?

Will people from certain religions and cultures be denied because of their religion and culture? Will people be disallowed from having children because of the color of their skin? Are we going to make it illegal for people with physical disabilities or certain sexual orientations to have children?

And one can say oh that won't happen, it will be totally fair and all about having a safe home. But when has the state been totally fair and not corrupt? Won't money end up being a huge factor in who gets chosen and who doesn't and don't certain ethnic groups control higher percentages of the wealth?

I gave birth when I was underage and not just barely underaged, but quite young. My son has a great life and should be with me. He has autism and I wouldn't trust any another person to provide him for like I do and work for him like I do. If the state took my disabled child away from me, I doubt he would have a good life. I would be concerned about families being less interested in adopting him because of his special needs and not thinking of his future, not in the way that I do anyways. I wouldn't have /passed/ and wouldn't have been allowed to keep him if the state decided because I was young, poor and disabled myself.

Instead of talking about forced surgery or taking children away from undesirables who don't meet the state's idea of an upper class perfect home, I would rather look at increased support for high risk families and parents, such as increased programs and assistance for young parents, improvised parents, single parents and etc. I would also like to look at increased support for children who are in the foster system.

Player vs player in theory could be a wonderful and exciting thing. After all drama, conflict and change makes a better storyline than everyone getting along and everything staying the same. Conflict doesn't need resolve with the death or destruction of another character - it could be competition over who has the most social prestige, who throws the best parties and etc. Conflict could also resolve with characters coming to work together and get along. Conflict and competition often gets people more invested into games. However it can also go very very wrong.

I think player vs player should probably only be pursued when....

1. Everyone is on board and wants this kind of rp.
2. Everyone is prepared for the possibility that they might not come out ahead. That their character might be defeated whether that ends in character death or in just not getting a title or whatever.
3. Anyone engaging in player vs player should like each other ooc and respect each other's rp or at least be neutral toward each other. Anyone who dislikes each other ooc, is having an ooc conflict or is healing from a recent ooc conflict should avoid pvp rp with each other. It is better to avoid/ignore a player/character one cannot stand than engage in pvp.
4. The player vs player storyline is not being pursued ooc and people are not getting on discord and plotting how to /get/ the characters they are against and etc.
5. Everyone involved doesn't view their character as totally the hero/good person in the situation, but sees it as a more complicated situation and is able to see that their character has some faults.
6. It is not a case of ooc clique against ooc clique, but is the result of story. Or rather it is character vs character rather than player vs player.
7. Fading to black and hand waving is always kept as an option if anyone involved is no longer having fun.
8. Players have only one alt going after any given character and are careful to avoid any COI.
9. Nobody is being stalked, harassed or followed around and etc.
10. One is being careful to not use information their character wouldn't have access to in the conflict
11. Having fun is the goal rather than winning.
12. Everyone can emotionally distance from the situation and are in a headspace there they can take a break when needed and etc.

I love the ic only command. I finally turned it off. But when I had it on, I really needed it on and it helped me immensely. I think it can help to give someone space who feels a bit pushed ooc about things or who just want to log on rp and not deal with ooc. It really helped me during the pandemic when my time was super limited to feel like I could log in with my low energy and just check mail or whatever.

I also appreciate the player storyteller which I think is including many more players and giving people alternate ways to join the storyline. I haven't had time to fully appreciate and take advantage of such as real life is still a bit busy. But Too Old for This makes a great point. There are work arounds. And one of the best work arounds of all is living well, having fun, making your own story, including others, finding rp partners and rping on.

Also, I cannot blame staff for everything that happens on a game - they don't know everything that happens and if things are not reported they might have no idea.

The most important things for a positive mush experiences and environment starts with oneself. There are def some things I had to look at and change in myself to be a better player.

Yeah, I can certainly see wanting to log on quietly at times. There are certainly times when I just want to be left alone. There are even times when I want to be left alone by a player who I do genuinely like. I am just not in the mood that day.

I am a bit biased on this topic, because I am still creeped out about past experiences with people trapping me with alts or doing pov conflict with me on alt after alt while concealing its them. Would a registry have helped that? Maybe in these cases.

That being said, it certainly won't stop every case like this.

And I also experienced a well known creeper hitting on my alts again as he sneaked on after being banned and that certainly wouldn't have stopped him.

@il-volpe

I had people use secret alts against me and so I would welcome alts being public on any game. Some of things I experienced, I don't think people would even try if their alts were public to other players.

It would be too long a story and degrade into too much of a rant to talk about my experiences specifically - but I had people be like oh she will be in trouble in this player vs player conflict with my character if she talks about x. I will make a secret alt who will try to lure her to talk about x while my alt's protegee is in the room to witness and etc. That kind of stuff is toxic af and transparency might help.

Its harder to go after the same character again again on different alts with transparency and its harder to lay ooc traps with outted alts.

Sadly some people will take advantage of secret alts to mess with people and even if they rule is that cannot do such, if one doesn't know it is their alt, than one cannot report it. And just knowing that alts are public is enough to stop some people from trying to trap with alts.

Of couse some people will be jerks no matter the rules.

I think that it is pretty unfair to expect anyone to run a game on their own free time without being paid and not play that game themselves. While I think it is ideal if staff doesn't play the game, I think it is also way to much to ask and expect.

So I am for staff being able to play the game they run. Although I think they should follow the rules of any other player and should restrain themselves and be capable of using some judgement.

For example on City of Hope, staff seems to be allowed more alts than players or to play multiple alts in high ranking positions and I think that does create problems.

I don't staff on any games and I probably never will. I am super grateful that some people are willing to staff and I would never feel like it would be okay for me expect them to run a game and then not enjoy it themselves.

However there can absolutely be issues with staff alts getting special treatment be it real or imagined. I even okay with staff alts getting a little bit extra, they work harder after all. So long as I still feel like the game is fun to play and plot is accessible t people who are not staffers and etc.