Intimate Interactions

Billie, a lifetime EDS (Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome) veteran with ten years of actively seeking help in the healthcare system, guides us through some basics of surviving severe sickness and loss of ability be it temporary or permanently. Content warning: this content might be hard for some folks, so please give yourself permission to turn it off or take some space from it for a while. We talk about losing the embarrassment around disability and using grieving as an opportunity to move through loss and grief towards exploration of new and interesting parts of the human condition.

My personal feeling is that in some ways we’re explorers getting to navigate uncommonly traversed parts of the human condition. That’s easy for me to say right now when I’m not on the floor of my bedroom crawling towards the toilet with 9 out of 10 pain. It certainly has adjusted who I am and how I relate to my body. It has certainly changed how I process messages from my body. It’s like - when your body texts in all caps, you just get used to it after a while. It’s not that it’s any easier, but you get stronger at breathing and surviving, and in that experience comes a relief of the fear that comes when you’re not sure if you can make it or not.

This session is split into two parts: this episode, and the next one on grief, loss, and having funerals for our abilities. Content warning: this might get graphic. For now, let’s start the conversation about positives, coping, and managing chronic illness here with Billie on Intimate Interactions.

This session, Robin and I reminisce fondly about an intimate moment from the past. After waiting years for a certain queer experience, Robin finally got the birthday present she wanted. Afterward we talk about fluid exchange hierarchies and polyamory risk profiles.

Remember, Robin’s second book Polyglamorous: a Queer mom’s misadventures and lessons in non monogamy is available if you want more content. Check her out at https://robinsnestcoaching.com or find her book at: https://alternativesexuality.ca/shop

https://alternativesexuality.ca/shop.html

We form opinions of people piece by piece. First, Robin was a stripper. She took off her clothes as a house girl, but it was offering lap dances to men in the clubs where she earned most of her money. She needed that money to get through nursing school where she went on to become a psychiatric nurse. She also made money pro domming men. Is any one of those professions more a sale of her body than the others? Is any one asking her to do more emotional labour than the others? Why do we attach judgement to some professions and not others?

But I’m getting ahead of myself as usual - let’s let Robin tell the story. And if you like it, feel free to buy her book on https://robinsnestcoaching.com or at https://alternativesexuality.ca/shop.html. But for now, let’s get some intimate stories for free from Robin herself on Intimate Interactions.

Billie is back with more hard hitting content. Her dark humour and our ability to laugh with each other about our situations and at ourselves is especially impressive in her case since she’s a lifetime EDS (Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome) veteran, braving hospitals actively for ten years. With accessory conditions like POTS (Postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome), Billie talks about her chronic illnesses and the challenges she’s had having her pain or condition taken seriously.

We talk about psilocybin and cannabis this session as well as other medications and premenstrual dysphoric disorder; content warning for graphic descriptions. We joke about the early medical establishment, hysteria, masturbation, and other topics.

Yana Skorstengaard, a graduate student with ADHD, chats about the pros and cons of having ADHD and the strategies folks can use to offset the negatives and maximize the positives.

Gloria’s back to finish talking about anti-blackness and racism like the way the police raise guns towards children more often when they’re Black in the US. Gloria and I talk about hard shit today. As a content warning - though let’s be honest, my introductions have turned into giant content warnings - near the end, we talk about Gloria’s breast cancer diagnosis - don’t worry, she’s in remission - and how it led to a renewed lease on life, too short to be ashamed of being who she is. Autism, non-monogamy, Blackness, femmeness, and aging - these are things to be celebrated and embraced. But I’ll let you hear about it from Gloria, here on Intimate Interactions.

This session, we talk about Orcas in the Pacific Northwest. Billie tells us anecdotes about the largest dolphin and we talk about different kinds. It’s a much needed and appreciated break for me from all the super heavy content I’ve been recording with Billie that’ll be coming out over the coming few months. Expect more sessions about chronic illness, disability, chronic pain, and ableism. Throughout all of it, Billie maintains her kind, positive, and intensely empathetic spirit. You’ll get a dose of that today just listening to her talk passionately about orcas.

We briefly get into pen and paper role playing games and video games towards the end of the session. I did say this one was less heavy than my other sessions with Billie, right? We very briefly talk about Enjoy!

How is ADHD a positive? Provided you have strategies and can compensate for thinking differently than others expect, ADHD can actually be quite a positive. Today I talk with Yana Skorstengaard, a graduate student with ADHD, about how she and I have worked with our brains to become academically accomplished. For me, that was achieving two full time science semesters on the Dean’s List (more than an A average); while Yana is taking a graduate degree in a subject she passionately cares about. While academic success isn’t really a measure of life success, achieving one’s goals when one is constantly told they get distracted and won’t achieve or can’t amount to anything, it’s refreshing to have another perspective to remind folks that ADHD can be an advantage and can give you the ability to deep dive and hyperfocus and achieve where more normative thinkers who don’t have ADHD would not be able to maintain the attention as long as an ADHD thinker could. But I’ll let Yana tell you more about that here on Intimate Interactions.

From Gloria’s history in Portland in the 70s to Hogan’s Alley in Vancouver, we talk about anti-Blackness and how it has shaped the world we live in. Gloria once joined a cult, and she opens up about this experience today. Despite everything different about the cult, spoilers: it was also racist and prohibited miscegenation or interracial relationships.

I really appreciate my friendship with Gloria and the way we can laugh about things that are just horrific. It helps me get through it and hopefully she feels the same. Somehow despite the ickiness and gravity of the things she brings up, her light and funny personality always seems to find a way to shine through it all. This session was pulled out of a longer recording so it may end abruptly. Don’t worry, Gloria will be back in a couple of weeks to finish out the conversation.

Billie, an EDS (Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome) veteran of ten years with other conditions like POTS (Postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome) talks about her chronic illnesses and the challenges she’s had having her pain or condition taken seriously. Content warning: this might get graphic.

Billie brings a refreshing and positive perspective around not diminishing your experience or comparing yourself to people harder hit by life or circumstance. I’m excited to share that perspective with you here on Intimate Interactions.