this is disabled girls who lift. We are reclaiming what's rightfully ours. One podcast at a time. It's mary Beth Chloe and Marcia bringing you the thoughts and unpopular topics to get you out of that. A bliss comfort zone. Mhm. Mhm. Welcome everyone to yet another episode of disabled girls too who lift to lift whatever. Anyways. Thank you to our lovely patreon for supporting us on disabled girls who lift dot com slash patreon. And um scary way saying shape this is Marsha on south florida land. Seminole tribe, land pronoun. She they we got mary Beth on deck and a guest scanned great way to stay in shape. So you've got to put a caveat there because it's okay if you're not in shape during this two year pandemic. Uh mary Beth she heard from northern California here sitting on a lonely land and we're super stoked to be having Monica and low with us today here in the west side.

Los Angeles California sitting on tongue the land. I looked that up this morning um 28 years old. What got me super excited that she did N. C. Double A. Water polo in college. Um And like very a lot of us discovered powerlifting um and what it does to our mental and physical strength. She is currently um a construction worker after getting her mechanical engineering degree from caltech. Damn you bring so much to the table. Welcome. Also Next korean black and white. Um We loved our we love our mixed babies coming to the podcast. Welcome awesome. Thank you guys so much. It was a very nice intro and I'm so glad you looked up what land I'm on because I did not, I have no idea. I learned something new about California history every time I hang out with one of my former roommates, um she's born and bred in California and so she always has a fun negative California history to drop on me.

I Love that. I mean I was raised in L. A. For what, 18 years and I had no idea such a big land too. It is a lot. And the connection is not always there. You might not even see the indigenous folks. You might not even never no one. And then you just like this California. It's all it ever was right. But hello, it's been, it was Mexico for such a long time. Y'all forget yeah, something about the mission signs that are posted the same Gabriel mission and then you're like, we should maybe take those signs down. Those are in bad taste now. No one. No one likes the missions anymore. Wait, what do you mean mission signs? Oh, so in southern California, the way it was settled by the whites was through missions through uh priests coming out and setting up missions to convert the indigenous people. The name is still, yeah, there will be signs around like you're driving on the freeway and I'll be like the san Gabriel mission.

I was yesterday. I was friday. I was driving and I was like, oh yeah, no, we should take that sign down. Damn. That's literally all over California though. Like in middle school elementary school, we were taken on these field trips to visit these missions to Yeah, the Big X. Big X. Yeah. It's like when they talk about like plantations in the south and you like, don't put it together. And then like, you see folks go on field trips to like plantation and you're like, that's, that's not, that's not okay. I shouldn't be doing that. Yeah, There are black kids here. We shouldn't, we shouldn't go to the plantation. Yeah. Well, and the way that you're telling history from a certain perspective to write who, who's leading the tour, uh, as someone who took God knows how many years of Georgia history. Um, for some reason, the civil war didn't seem that bad and then it wasn't until later in life that I was like, oh yeah, no, that was, that was really bad.

Why don't we say actually how bad it is. Like there's so much there that we just kind of gloss over and like some memories, like one particular history class I took that was like, oh yeah. And there were nice slave owners that gave their slaves like nice accommodations and didn't beat them. And I was like reflecting on it now. I'm like yikes. Like we have so much to undo the fact that we teach kids that there were nice slave owners. No, no, no, we need to we need to cut that completely. Yeah, that's pretty trash. I'm just like the not all men. Yeah. Hashtag not all sleep, not on organizer's okay. Some colonizers just wanted land and then they made it nice for everyone. Gosh, I'm sure you have to unlearn a lot of that and I'm sure that's probably even worse that you're mixed and all different things.

Right? And you know, from birth or is that like a later thing? Uh Yeah, so when I was like nine months old, I was diagnosed with asthma. And so I spent two stints in the hospital under two years. The second time I actually had to be airlifted into a hospital because they were like up, she's blue. Well here we go. Uh so I had asthma as a kid, so the whole steroid treatment uh nebulizer, everything like that. And then it wasn't until I was in college, I was 20 when I was officially diagnosed with, you see. Um So that is that is my chronic illness journey and there's probably something else wrong with me to, you know, whatever happens just one at a time. But I'm just curious because we way earlier, like some way earlier episodes, we were talking about how we deal with all these parts of ourselves separately, right?

Like like we just deal with like, like when mary Beth was younger, she was just like, I'm just gonna pretend to be mexican. I'm not going to deal with this asian thing right now? I gotta deal with this arm thing. Like that's too much. Right? Like you just like tuck something away, you know, like all right. This is what I'll do with her right now. Oh, 100%. I actually had an instance this past weekend yesterday. In fact earlier this week, my buddy, a fellow black person who attended caltech one of the, if you've ever seen Hassan Minaj just talking about the like seven black kids who went to caltech between like 2011 and 2016. Hello. It's me. And this is one of the other ones, um, by my buddy who lives across the street from me. And he was like, hey, are you going to the like black alumni lunch over this weekend? And I was like, I don't, I don't have the energy to be black this weekend. So I'm just not going to be black this weekend.

Um, because that's a whole emotional thing. There's a lot of stuff, It's going to be people being upset and angry and trying to be happy and I'm like, I just don't have the emotional energy to be black and it was like, especially after this past year, seeing all the different phases of like, what are you going through now? It's like, okay, black asian chronically ill woman. Okay. Which one of those things is going to, cause the problem today. Like how am I going to address this? It's like in college, I was given the choice. I either got to be a woman or I got to be black. I either got to be involved with the women's stuff and go to the women in engineering things or whatever or I could be black and unfortunately the university needed me to be black more than they needed me to be a woman. And so I was, I eventually took over all the black clubs is like a junior and senior when my buddy graduated. So yeah, and it's like congrats, I'm the elder black person on campus and if we're checking, I'm a quarter right.

Um, and so it's like that kind of visibility and it's like, okay, well I guess I'm black for the foreseeable future and then showing up places and being like, oh no, I work in construction. I'm the only woman like first jobs, like a couple jobs ago when I showed up on site, like they had to be like briefed and no one spoke to me for like three months because I'm the first woman that most of those guys had ever worked with on site and they were like terrified to say something to me say the wrong thing to me. They were like, well if we can't say what we want to say that just won't say anything at all. I'm like, guys, I'm just a person just like, I don't know your wife or like your daughter or your sister. I'm not an alien. You can just talk to me and just not be really, really freaking weird about it. Um and so yeah, so it's like, okay, well now I'm a woman and then it only takes one thing and then it's like, okay, when can these things coexist and when can I like embrace?

Each of these things is like part of my holistic identity and not have to be like, no, no, no, Today I'm Black. No, no, no. Today I'm asian. Um today I'm a woman and today we're advocating for the chronically ill. Like those things are all they're all me and they shouldn't have to be separated and I shouldn't have to approach them in that way. But I just feel like people aren't ready to embrace the holistic approach to dealing with individuals. Mm Quite people don't want to have to think that hard and they're like, I already can't understand one part of you. Now, you want me to understand how many I'm not interested. That's what it comes down to. People don't like being uncomfortable at dating in Los Angeles. Um that was that was my current struggle of being like, listen, I'm I am a complex person not to say that other people are not complex individuals. But there's a lot of layers built up here and like not to say traumatic experiences but there's a lot of stuff.

There's a lot of back story and it's like having to get through that too. Even get through a date with someone to be like, no, no, no, it's not that simple. Like I'm it's a whole thing. I don't recommend stating in Los Angeles um being everywhere. But it's so hilarious. It's hilarious because shouldn't we be used to it by now. The 2021 California is quote unquote diverse. Los Angeles is even more so. But when it comes to, you know, when you when you're talking about the men in construction who feel so uncomfortable with their presence, is it because, well, yeah, obviously like they see you as a woman, but when when they find out that you're also black and you're also korean and you're also chronically ill. It's like, oh all of a sudden they lost their safe space to speak freely about how misogynistic and racist and sexist they are.

And that is like, like a discovery that a lot of white men on men in general are not ready For 100% they are showing us. Yeah. Being like, oh no, I can't say that thing and it's like good, you shouldn't, right? Yeah. It sounds like a you problem. I'm not willing to compromise. Like I'm going like at this point, um I may be my biological curse on this podcast please. Um okay, sick, I've run out of funds to give um and like I've run out of the like Chairing like I've stopped caring about how my speaking my truth and being who I am makes other people uncomfortable. Yeah but we should never cared. That's like the bigger problem.

The fact that that's like a realization and announcement right? Like so radical to say we don't teach you that when you're a mixed kid in the south and everyone else is white. Your mom is the only black person in the entire neighborhood. No one teaches you that. Yeah, it's a it's a whole thing to unpack when you get there and you're like wow. And you're like wait this is how white men just be living. Amazing. Yeah. How I applied to my last job. I remember what I was looking for the current job that I have now. Um I went the ceo reached out to me and he knew me from a previous job. He reached out to me asked me to apply, I clicked on the website, there were two postings listed, one was for a representative position, one was her advantage of position instinctively. I clicked on the rep position and I was like reading it and I was like okay yeah this seems reasonable that I was like wait wait wait hold on. White guys Men in general will apply to a job even if they barely meet 50% of the qualification most definitely.

And so I was like screw this and I clicked on the manager position and I read it and I was like I mean like 70% 80% of what's on here, I can do, this that's why I was like okay I'm gonna apply to the manager position. What are they gonna do say you know what Monica you're not qualified to be a manager but we do have a rep position available. Like that's the worst thing that happens. Just don't get the job, whatever I have a job. Um And then I applied interviewed and I got it and I was like this is how that happens. It's like major space bitches. Yeah like the fact that it happens, the fact is I'm like the only person in the world who does my particular job and I'm like damn good at it and people can kiss my multi ethnic ass. Um There it is about it. So I'm with you on that. It's pretty asked backwards though because like you don't have anywhere to go for that feeling, right?

Like you just so you came from like all these white dudes that just basically feel like you should just be like oh yeah thanks for having me right? Um But then if you get like super super black, super you know surrounded by people of color then it's like oh we'll be your own boss, don't let the white man do this for you. Then you're just like but what if I do want to where am I supposed to go? It's like like it's hustle culture or just say please white man like what, where am I supposed to go and I'm so tired, hustle culture. So tiring. Like I'm I'm a girl boss. But man it's exhausting and sweet. Hashtag girl buzz like that Tiktok Audio that's like I'm afraid I may have girl lost a little too close to the sun. Uh That's how I feel these days. I'm like oh no oh God. Like I realized very recently um since switching my meds that I need like eight hours of sleep a day.

Like for sure eight hours of sleep if not my U. C. Flairs and I am sad. Um And so then it's like okay well I work 10-12 hours a day. I need eight hours of sleep and it takes this long to drive and now I have 30 minutes of free time to myself to relax and do hashtag self care. Like the hours are just not adding up these days and I'm like okay thankfully my company has unlimited paid time off. So and they mean it oh yeah we're about that like mental health, everything like that and I'm big into it and my ceo is also very supportive of like hey you need to take a day off. Like you need to take time off, take your time off. Just disconnect turn your phone off, don't worry about it. Um And so like having the ability to do that and being able to say like, okay, no, they respect my time. I'm going to take this time for myself if that has been insanely helpful for me very recently.

Well, that's new. That is new because this is I work at a startup now. Um And so there's that freedom and I for two years I was working in a more corporate culture environment. Um you know, white boys in Patagonia vests and Gucci Gucci loafers kind of thing. Um And being in like, the construction division of a company like, that is uh quite interesting. Um But it was a great job. My manager was insanely supportive of me and the head of my department also, because I actually was hospitalized when I started that job um Two months into starting that job. My you see spread. And I had no idea what was going on because the symptoms manifested themselves differently than when I had first been diagnosed with, you see. And so I had no idea what was going on. And they were like, you need to go to the emergency room. And I was like, ha ha ha, okay. Like, I'm pending the test if I go to the er it'll expedite getting my cT scan so fine.

And I went in and they were like, all right, here's your bracelet. Yeah. And I was there for a week and I was like, what? No, I just came here for a cT scan, Why are you admitting me to the hospital? Um And I law ended up losing like £30 in like 2.5 weeks because I couldn't eat anything. Uh they put me on 60 mg of predniSONE a day. Uh And I it was the most miserable between that the Norco the muscle relaxer, the anti spasm medication to try to get through it. So I was effectively a vegetable for about 2.5 months after getting out of the hospital before I was finally able to get on Remicade and have the Remicade actually start working for me. Um It's a Remicade. Remicade is a biologic infusion drug. And so I started that which the process to get infusion meds for chronically ill folks or any one of these Stelara and tvo Remicade Humira you about M.

S. I don't remember the names but that's a whole ordeal. Be there without insurance. one dose of this medication. Just the medicine Les Price is $30,000. So without insurance, without processing the claims without doing all that fun stuff. And by the way now you need a separate facility you have to go where like this drug has to be administered in the same facility that chemo patients get their chemo infusions right. Um And as cedars Sinai here because I have a proud member of the cedars Sinai network of doctors. Um That way I don't have to explain my medical history and it's all in one database. Um They keep they have their ambulatory infusion center which is like without insurance. 15 grand to just go there and sit, wow okay sick. And then all you're after, you know two months of working with your insurance company to get it approved and everything like that.

You finally get it, get it through And it's still $650. And the hospital makes you pay for parking because they don't validate. Which is just, that's just the like that's the straw that broke the Camel's back. No, that was like like I have to pay for, I have to pay to park here to pay you some more. I'm like you, it's the biggest scam because you know every person who goes into that facility is stuck there for at least three hours to like one hour because you have to go in. You have to get speed. Yeah. And so you know that you're there that you've got them for at least three hours and they And they don't validate and you're like Okay, so now it's just $10 an hour for me to park in your facility. Like you guaranteed $30 every time from cancer patients. Yeah, most of these people are cancer patients should be illegal honestly. And the fact that the fact that they charge you like a hospital rate for something that you're not staying in the hospital for it be fucking illegal to like that makes no sense to me.

Yes That they should have separate clinics giant scam. It's not even just separate. Just the fact that if you go to a hospital for an appointment whether or not you stay in the hospital like she said, she stayed for the week, right or she's in and out one day for the infusion. They're still going to charge the hospital day raped. It's the american healthcare system is broken. Yeah, it should be illegal. So like, I don't know what happened to your games after that. There's no way you're like barely this thing a bottle of water after though. Uh how long ago was that? That was 2019. Not that long ago. It's not that long ago. I am like still feeling the effects of, you know that and what that meant for essentially wiping factory reset is what happened like my whole ass fell off my body. It was gone like none of my pants fit because I was a plank. I was just flatter than a board and I was like, this isn't okay.

I don't like this. I like this at all. Um and I remember the first day going back to the gym with my friend. It was like that october probably late september that I went back to the gym and I went to unwrap the bar to squat and I remember unwrapping just of something that to me is like second nature. Like I've never not been able to spot the bar And I remember squatting it and it was so hard to get back, I didn't think I was going to be able to make it back up and I just like, yeah, just the empty bar and I like, broke down. I like, I was like, oh my God, what has happened to me? Like where, where did it all go? This is like, it's such a huge part of my identity and now I can't do it. Um So catch me at the gym carrying on the squat rack because I can't scroll bar. Um and thankfully, uh once I was able to start eating and actually just moving again, it got better and within like a couple months I was back to squatting, you know, two plates.

Like, I bounced back pretty fast after that, but it was still that like slow, yes, we're going and You said you were down 30 lb, like Holy Ship. Yeah, I was down £30 and then I boomerang very quickly due to the predniSONE was like, hey, by the way, you want to eat potato chips all day. Yeah, they're pretty, they're pretty. How many assholes were like, oh my God, you lost some weight, Monica, you look so good. Amazingly no one, so thank the Lord, because like, you could tell in my face, I was so swollen from the predniSONE, right? So in my face, my face didn't look the same as what my body looked like, right, And people like if anything this is this is going to be a low key moment here. My mom is the only person who commented on whether or not my weight loss looked good. Um And when I was like, I can't wait to gain my butt back.

And she was like, no, no, no it's fine. Like you look really good like this and blah blah blah blah blah. And I was like this is this is not the flesh sack that I want to exist in. Like this one sucks. Um And she was like, no, just like just don't eat too much, just keep the weight off blah blah blah blah blah. And I was like, I look like a skeleton like um Yeah and so moms and aunties. Yeah. My mom, my mom was yeah is a victim of toxic diet culture. Um in a way that like, you know it, you want to look like Cindy Crawford in the eighties spinning into a size for Calvin klein jeans like that that does things to you. And it takes a lot to unpack body image and all of that stuff. Because you know, I was even looking at old photos of myself from like 2016 2017 at times where I was like, I remember taking the photos being like off, I look big like this.

I look puffy or whatever. And I like thinking about it now. I'm like damn, I would pay money to look like that again. This covid, this covid weight and like the tummy I've gotten just because of uh trying to work on my own disordered eating habits and trying to like separate myself from diet culture over the pandemic. Um That's been like, my personal project is really working on that for myself. Um And so I'm sitting about, You know, £15 heavier than I like, like to sit, and that's, and I'm wondering, and now I'm in the face of like, why is it, why is it that you want to sit at like 1 53 and why is it that 1 68 bothers you so much the number doing to you. Yeah. What is that doing to me? Um But, you know, it's working through that and not recognizing myself, right?

It's, that has to be one of the hardest things about changes. Yeah, Chronic illness. And it was when I was, when I was diagnosed at 20, I was in college and I put on the freshman 50. I gained £50 my freshman year. The cookies at two a.m. Every day plans. Yeah, the pizza parties and yeah, the alcohol and the depression. I was so depressed. I was failing all my classes. I was just depressed a shit. Um And So I gained 50 lb. The sophomore year, I, you know, through unhealthy methods was starting to lose it. I took about £25 off my soft throughout the course of my sophomore year and it was between sophomore and junior year that that summer I was like okay, I'm actually going to start eating right, working out well. It started with me being like, I think I'm allergic to something. Am I allergic to soy? Am I allergic to us?

I don't know. Let's try an elimination diet. Um Then I started just shooting myself uncontrollably. I couldn't walk more, I couldn't walk to campus without having to stop three times to go to the bathroom. Um And credit to my best friend slash college roommate who was like, hey Monica, that's not normal. You need to go to the doctor. I was like, no, I'm fine. It's just like an allergy or something. She's like, no, You've lost like £20 in like two weeks. You can't like you are shooting yourself. And I was, I was so proud to, I was like, oh man, look at all this hard work at the gym. Finally starting to pay off. Look at me go. She was like, what am I, honey, no, that's not what's happening here. Yeah. I was like, what? Okay. I was like fine. I'll go to the doctor. Well I go to the campus health center and they're like, maybe it's parasites. And so they tested me and they're like not parasites. Um And I had another doctor who is this really racist Russian lady.

Um And she uh had a med student with her. And over the course of this particular appointment, she made the med student cry. Uh and then the mets in your appointment in my appointment, she made the med student cry. She also every time I walked in would be like you're black, right, what the fuck? And I'm like yeah just like and you go to caltech, I'm like yeah I don't see how that's relevant to this appointment should be like, oh so how does that work? Every every appointment, every appointment expecting you to explain affirmative action or something. I think so, but caltex not an affirmative action school like that unfortunately caltex not an affirmative action school, we could do a lot more there if it was. Um But yeah and so but thankfully this appointment uh she was like after the med student comes back in and it's like oh and I'm like it's okay.

I think you're doing great like um this uh this doctor comes back in and it's like so based on everything like she's like exhibiting signs of something. Probably like Crohn's a real sort of colitis mm And the message was like okay. Like so she's like so what do we need to do now was like for you to a specialist, Maybe we can we can we take it easy on this poor girl. Um And yeah I read about that too. No I was just like so I go to the nurse in the front who's to refer me to a specialist at the hospital in Pasadena where I was going to school and I get there and I can hear the nurse on the phone, she calls a specialist. It's like, hey I have someone who needs to get in to see a doctor asap because at this point now I'm like bad, like real bad.

And the nurses like patient gives them my date of birth. And I hear that there's just a pause and I hear the person on the other end go, she's too young to have you see Classy I said what I said and this nurse, like I am thankful to this nurse and this nurse alone for her work because she goes, if you do not get her in to see one of these doctors when they're off rotation within the next three days, she's going to end up in the hospital under one of those doctors on their rotation and that's gonna be on you. So you better get her in and I expect to get a call from you about the doctors availability when they're off call and you are going to get her and to see one of these doctors, she will go to the hospital if necessary for an appointment with one of these doctors, but she will be seen this week. And I was like uh and the person on the other hand was like okay I guess you could just hear like grumbling on the other end.

And the nurse was like that's what I thought, thank you so much. Really appreciate your help today by u the college campus nurse. Yeah well so this is actually my private practice lawyers. So she's like actual actual nurse lady, she's like, she turns to me and she's like okay sweetie. So God just like turn that up, which mode disengaged. And she was like, so the specialist office said they're going to call you with some availability of when the doctor can see you. And I was like, I was right here the whole time. You don't have to pretend I heard you on the phone, like I heard you, you want me to believe you. Yeah. And I was like okay. Yeah and sure enough within 48 hours they called me, I was in to see the specialist. Uh He put me on, oh gosh, the oppressed. So so the like mill saleh mean hills and like the uterus which is like a targeted steroid um specifically for like G.

I. Issues. Um So he put me on that and that pretty much because I was very localized. Oh no, I had a colonoscopy in that too. Um which was brutal. There's nothing like two weeks before finals um having to do a colonoscopy prep uh and your friends are like what you're doing and I'm like I really don't want to talk about it. Uh And then they then that's when I got my diagnosis got on the medicine um ended up having a severe reaction to the medication within the first like month of me being on it had to go to the er um like during, because it was when I got back to campus after winter break, so I've been on the men's about a month and then that I had a reaction between the stress of being back at school and I had a reaction to the meds. Um they sent me to the er because they thought I had meningitis of course and so I am delusional, I am sick.

I am having a reaction to these meds and they're like and I hate, oh by the way I cry, I cry at the doctor if I like going to the doctor, going to the er going sitting in a waiting room by myself, I will start crying. I hate it. I can't stand going to the doctor as someone who's been to the doctor their whole life. I still cry every time and that's what crime you've been like going to these clinic visits by yourself, you've been alone this entire time as well. Yeah, myself. Uh I had like I had to figure out you see alone. I felt like I had someone take to even take me to the appointments. It's like I had to walk from campus to the doctor's office, hoping and praying, like shout out to the day, I realized I should probably be by depend underwear from the store and I bought like the anti diarrheal medications. I thought would depend anything that I thought might help. And I was at the checkout line and there was this like grandma behind me and lying like buying the exact same things I was buying.

Little lady looked at what I was buying, looked at me, looked at her pile, looked back at me and I was like, I don't want to talk about it, don't talk To me about this. She minded her business and she minded her business and didn't say anything to me and I was like good. So I could tell she thought about it, she thought about saying something and then she was like I will not say anything, thank you club Honey. I was like yeah. And I was like and so it was like okay here I am 20 years old in college. She supposed be hashtag living it up in a great time. I wasn't having a great time. Uh it was brutal. And I didn't tell anyone uh like most Like I had friends like I have college friends who did not know I had a debilitating chronic illness and I was diagnosed with in college until like several years after like I was like 25 and like on a trip with them and was like, oh yeah like that summer that I almost died and they were like what?

Because everyone's gonna assume college or should I just drink too much probably alcohol poisoning or something? Yeah, assumptions and well they knew I was like, really into fitness, right? Like I work out a lot. I played sports like, and so they just figured like, okay, Monica just got her health in order. That's why she lost so much weight that summer Because I went from being, you know, like 175 lb to 145 lb, right? And you could tell like, they're like, if you look at the difference between me, like my sophomore year college versus what I look like my end of my junior year into my senior year, Like, you can just see it in my face and like everything like my arms and like, um so it was, it was the thing that most people just associated it with like my lifestyle, right? Because it makes sense. It's like, oh, she's really into fitness, but I was away like, oh, she just worked out a better over the summer. Lost the weight. There you go, Good on your roommate for catching that and saying, hey, it's only been two weeks.

That's a lot of freaking weight loss. Yeah. She uh I without her forcing me and being like, no, no, no, you need to go to the doctor. I like I wouldn't have gone so like six because I was, I was convinced that I was just allergic to something because at the time my mom was finding all these new allergies that she was having to foods and my sister was finding out that she was allergic to gluten and eggs and avocado and soy and nuts and whatever else. And so I was like, probably just like them to be allergic to something easier to. That's, that has an answer to it. That's the other thing you're going to end on to something that has an easy out just find out what is then I'll be fine. Yeah. And that's the end of the thought line And I fished even now I went to an allergist this past year because in the past year with the stress of 2020 and everything else, like I did have a flair. Like there is nothing more fun than figuring out a new side effect of conservative colliders flares is that your legs swell And can swell to be like twice their size.

Um, and so I couldn't walk for a few months of 2020 because my UC was flaring and it caused my legs to swell up so bad that I couldn't walk. Um you only have so much space in your in your abdomen, you like, you're like literally that bloated and that swollen up that you just block blood flow. Like your body can just do that when it feels like it. But jesus. Yeah, and it wasn't until I actually went to because I went to my general practitioner and I was like, hey, what's up? She was like, I think you got a spider bite on your leg. So she gave me antibiotics easy, the antibiotics did not work shocking. Um And so she was like, oh you probably need to go to a dermatologist. Um Well my dermatologist is a black lady. Um She is uh she is awesome and I was in her office and she was like looking at my leg and she actually did something but not a lot of doctors seem to do when you walk in for an appointment.

She read my chart, she read my history and so she's looking at my life, she was like, okay, like let's do a biopsy and see what's up, Like I'll have someone come in to take the sample. And then she stood there at the computer and she was like, reading more and she was like, wait, were you just at your gi doctor? And I was like, yeah, she's like the men with and she like, she's like, hold on, and I'm like, oh God, she leaves And I'm there and I'm just like, after like 10 minutes she comes back in and she's like, so we're not going to do a biopsy on your leg. And I was like, what do you mean you're not going to do a biopsy on my leg. Um But I just kind of looked at her, I didn't say it. but that was my internal thoughts because I was say anything when I'm at the Doctor Why Advocate for myself.

And I could sit there and silent. And so I was like down and she's like, this is your you see, she's like, you need, she's like, yeah, you this is uh we see this a lot with pregnant ladies when they have stuff. But we also see this sometimes in chronically ill patients. So folks, sometimes with arthritis, groans, um this is something like this may happen. Um She's like, you're having a flare, like you need to go, you need to go back to your gi and you need to get on Medicaid, you need to get on steroids. Um And I was like, thanks, bud, Thanks. But she figured it out in like 15 minutes. You know, just a little critical thinking. So you don't have a rheumatologist. Your main your main managers. The G. I, yep, my my main managers, my gi doctor, uh dr Theodore stein at cedar.

Sinai shouts out. Um I got someone that knows about immune stuff then because the gi doctors that I've seen are like, yeah, all right, well, I just do this part. You go see a rheumatologist, if you think it's everything, goodbye. Yeah, well, he's yeah, he's a specialist. Um And so he's like the head of G I over at cedars. Um And like, I think he's on the board or something like that. Don't quote me on that. But um he is very hot in the management and uh stuff at cedars. So uh I actually, the only reason I got an appointment with him Back in like 2016, I hated my own doctor because my other doctor was like, you just need to eat Bland chicken and rice in no spicy foods, and then you're using will get better. And I was like, shut up white man. And I was like, this is clearly not how doctors should be, there's gotta be something better. And so I called cedars and I was like, hey, is there any chance that I can get an appointment?

She was like, I don't know, like none of our doctors are taking new patients right now. Everyone's booked up. And I was like, okay, well uh put me on the list and call me if there's a cancelation, I live Like 10 minutes away so I can be there In 10 minutes if you call me. So just let me know. Thank you. Um later that week. Yeah, later that we should call it. She was like, hey, one of the doctors has an opening, get down here. Um And so I showed up and I'm sitting in his office and he was like, he opens my church to like, take notes. And he was like, wait, all right, are you a new patient? I was like, yeah, they said you had a cancelation today. So I came in and he was like, I'm taking new patient uh at the moment. That's hilarious. Yeah, it was like, okay, sure. What's up? Like, just goes with it.

He's like, all right. Like, I guess um I guess you're here now. So here we go at. I then we, you know, got on it. And uh you know, he took everything down and was like, okay, like, no, this is what it is. Like if we need to reassess your care and you know, like what we're doing as far as your treatment, like we can do that. Like, there are other options. It's not just throw at these pills that you like, you have other options so we can have those discussions. We can be open about the conversation of your care because he's like, I don't want you to be in a flare. I don't want to continue to have like, predict like predictable flares. Because it turns out I get a flare every time I start a new job. It's real bad. It turns out capitalism really stresses me out. Um And so trying to figure out what to do to mitigate that. Um So he's always been very uh reasonable in approaching my care.

Um Sometimes just like with any doctor, you're just frustrated that like, you feel like you can't get your point across. You're like, no, no, no, it's this thing. And they're like, no, it's this thing and you're like, no, I live here. I live in this thing. You know, it's this. And they're like, what the test results? Yeah. He's like, what the test results say, you're fine. And I'm like, the test doesn't feel fine ship. I was like, I'm not fine. The reality is I'm not fine. So until I feel fine, I'm going to keep coming back here and bothering you. So either you make me better and we fix this or you see me, this is your choice. You have to drink back. He met my mom when she was at the hospital with me. Okay. He met my mother. And so now my mother is like taking care of you, is he, I'll come tell, tell them your story.

I'll come. I'm like, so one time I was like, I understand that maybe don't make me call my mom. And he was like, okay. I was like her. Uh and also like doctor, I've been doing this for five years now. Come on. 5, 6, 7 years. I got notes buddy. Yeah, I got this all down. Come on, let's let's figure this out together. But that's really good because cedar Sinai is a really good hospital. A group of that's the big, big thing over there. Yeah. And I knew people that were on the wait list for years before getting an appointment. So I mean good on that lady for actually calling back because there's tons of assholes who acts to be on wait lists and they never called back. I said like reminders on my phone to call them back, they're like, oh yeah, I was just kidding. So uh looking assholes, Oh no, I'm, I'm so annoying. Uh like when he used to be and that's the worst part is like a part time job.

Yeah. And thankfully like during the pandemic, when I was like switching my medications and like a whole bunch of other stuff, like being at home made it so much easier to like care for myself because it wasn't like, I was like hiding in the bathroom at work or being like, okay, I gotta go out to the parking lot and sit in my car for 30 minutes so I can yell at some schmuck on the insurance company phone. Um to be like sucking approved my ship. You stupid a holes like we've had this for three weeks. Why isn't an approved? Um, so I will say that like on the one hand pandemic bat on the other hand, work from home Good. There's some things that are good and some things that are around so bad. Um, but before we continue, we're going to take our quick commercial break, which means if the folks are watching on Youtube, they're just going to watch us there at the screen. Uh huh. All right, we're back. We did it. We did it. Yes, we did it.

And so you know, wait, well, but hold your thought you got it. Don't lose it. Great. No, if I just wanted to share it quick cause you're talking about this insurance thing and calling people, I just shared with somebody and they didn't ever do this. I have like my own facts number and I will literally get my referrals or documents, facts to me so I can fax it to the next person myself because I got tired of the offices taking weeks to do it right or the other office being like, well we didn't receive it. Can you call them back and ask them to resend it? Because then I could be like no bitch. It was october 3rd at 2 19 PM fact successful. Look again. Okay. Like the fact that I have to do that. The fact that you're 2021 have to own your own facts this year. Exactly. Number one is online now. Thank the Lord. Yeah. Why can't you just email but whatever. Yeah. But like the fact that you have to do it and the fact that you have to have your own receipts and that you have to do all this stuff. Like I was just telling a friend, I was like, I feel like some days I need a personal assistant definitely to do the things like pay my medical bills.

Call the insurance company handle my car registration for me. Like just just stuff that you're like, oh I am exhausted. Like hey by the way, like three weeks ago I guess now I had to like take my Stelara like injection in my office um at work because ups couldn't deliver it to my home address and then wouldn't leave the package and then I smelt it on my Solera. And so I got my, my refrigerate A. S. A. P. S. Time sensitive medication three days after it had been shipped. And I was like who we cant be? We can't delay, we just have to take this now and hope it's still good right now. So we're just going to go into the office at work. Like the, I went into the nursing room because we do have a nursing room on our floor. Um and I take my injection, it's a needle. So I'm like strips container none.

And I like I was like, okay, there's none in here. I go into the women's bathroom and I'm like sharps container. No go to the people. I'm like, hey, is there a sharps container in on any of the bathrooms on this floor or like the other floor. And he was like, what you want to share behind? I was like, no, I gotta use needle. I was like I need, I need a place to deposit. This is like, do we not have like a sharps container where like you know folks like I'd be like people who need to do like injections and stuff like shots for them to deposit that they were like, oh I don't know and like keep in mind this is one of those like we work type spaces where you know during pride month with their little L. G. B T. Q. I plus plus, plus, plus, plus, plus plus stickers, everything inclusivity. And I'm like, hey, I will let you guys know that disabled and chronically ill inclusivity is a thing as well.

And I was like guys like here, let me check, I'll ask the building if there's any bad. So he goes to the building man, he comes back like 15 minutes later and he's like, hey, so the only, so I can take you down the freight elevator to the loading dock where there is a place for you to deposit that. And I was like, so you're telling me who just took medication because I am sick that you think be going down the freight elevator to a loading docks to deposit my needle in that garbage can is I was like I will just take the view. I was like I will just take this home and deposited in my own sharps container. Thank good. I'm like we should, I'm just going to make a note to you. I would have put that on the next survey you guys send out. Yeah you see that in public bathrooms. You all get it together. McDonald's Task one.

Yeah. You don't need to be a hospital to have a sharps container come on. Like if I can go to a Mcdonald's and deposit my needle like we have bigger issues. Um Yeah, that is a big, big yikes. All right, mary beth where were you at? You were holding it. You got it was still there. Oh, no, no. I told you that's probably a card most. I'm just curious about how the symptoms have changed in the last, you know, eight or some years now. Oh gosh. Um, symptoms have changed in that since it's spread over the past two years. Like the sensation of uh where it used to be localized to like my lower rectum was very like a very specific sensation, right? And so for six years I had the knowledge that like, okay, but it feels like this probably go to the doctor.

Okay. But now that it spread and it affects a different part of my colon. Amazingly enough, the lower part of my rectum is well controlled. So like I would do the scope on me in the office and they'd be like, there's no inflammation here. And I'm like, no, no, no, there's inflammation software because I'm still shooting myself to death. Like somewhere there is inflammation because I haven't had a solid poop in like two months. Okay. And they're like, it's not your lower rectum. And I was like, and it's higher up, maybe we should go there. Wait, there's more so that part, the medication I'm on, what I'm doing that parts controlled. I'm not worried about my lower rectum anymore. What the problem is is figuring out how to treat and how to get this like the transverse colon. So it's like the part like basically like right underneath your titties that crosses across your body that crosses the other.

Yeah, we're all the other organs are too like your stomach pancreas, everything else. And so it's one of those things where it's like does my tummy hurts? Is it my large intestine? Because I've actually like hunger cues. I have a problem with hunger cues now if I weren't the type of person who religiously eats just like every hour. Um And it's just constantly eating because I could really. Yeah I'm like wait yeah so like thankfully I've conditioned myself and because I, you know, was on the like powerlifting competition training cycle. Like I've always like for the past, you know, many years I was on a very set. Like I eat in the morning, I eat at 11 am I eat at two p.m. I eat at five p.m. I eat at eight p.m. Like I I have the set times that I eat. Um And so my body inherently I am like okay, just muscle memory go to kitchen, anything, go to kitchen anything.

Um But I'm like especially with this new job now that I'm like working a lot more hours and like I'm doing a lot more. I'm traveling, I'm you know, I'm Yeah, like my like, there are some days where it's like, huh? What is this pain? Like what is why does it hurt? And then I'm like, oh, it's two PM and you haven't eaten since six, Like, you're hungry, you stupid ho go get a cheeseburger. Like that's like having to be like this shot again and like going through the drive through. Yeah. And so it's like uh that's the main thing and that uh and another thing that's changed for me is the doctor used to be able to go off of my c reactive protein as a measure of my inflammation. Um And so that's that's true blood work. So it used to be that my blood work was what would tell me like, oh, blood work's good, you're good.

Blood work. Bad bad. Now. My blood work doesn't that protein reactive counts doesn't give any indication for my help match how you feel, nope. And you know, what does stool test? Nice. And it's nothing like sitting in a plastic cup to start today when you have predictable ships, that's what. But when your sample collection kit is at home and your body has just shipped whatever it feels like you don't shoot at home like you ship at the sushi restaurant, you ship at the Mcdonald's on your way to work. You ship wherever the time strikes you because you can't hold it. You can't be like, oh, I have to poop, I'm gonna hold it and then hopefully just poop when I get home. No no no that's not how you see works. There's no holding it, there's either shit or shoot yourself. There is no in between nice carry everywhere you go.

Yeah but you have to know the thing is you have to refrigerate it, like you have to freeze it like and so it's either ship the Mcdonald's and then go immediately from the Mcdonald's be like, hey sorry sorry mr client. I had to ship in the Mcdonald's on my way to you and I have to like either I have to take the sample home and freeze it or poop home. Yeah I got to take it um And then I was like you know what? They don't just take my sample collection kit to work and keep it there and hopefully at some point it'll line up and then I was like No one at the work communal office space. Once my poop sample and the freezer at work, no one wants that. No they didn't, no one there signed up for that. I was like I feel weird and bad if I like even if I put it in like a container within a container in a container, I still feel weird putting it in the communal fridge at work. Like. And so I'm just like well one of these days it will line up and I will actually be able to poop in my own home um and collect my sample and get to the doctor, Good time at that point.

I I mean sh it I'd be like, I give zero ships, I'm already dealing with so much, you'll have to deal with it with me and you you don't even have to know, you know, or they don't have to know, they don't have to know. But I know it's like, yeah, here's someone's lean cuisine and that's my poop. Like, like, I just, it makes it like having to explain to my roommates, like, granted my old roommates, God bless him, took care of me understood my situation. They're basically family to me at this point. Um and being like, hey, don't touch the mysterious plastic baggie, that's my poop. They're like, God, I've had to do it for my dogs all the time, but it's like doggy bag, plastic bag lunch bag, like a brown bag lunch bag that says Maple on it, but for us, we had a refrigerator, do not freeze it, which I would assume would get rid of the smell.

Mhm. Yeah, I mean, it does, it doesn't smell right? I'm just like weird, it's just weird, and we named this episode, Let's talk about pooping, shooting the ship with Monica, I love it. I really do goal it. Um Loki uh before we move on. Speaking of poop my Tinder profile right now. My bio literally says my ship not, may not be together but that's just because I have IBD that's what my whole last dating profile sentence just leave it so straight to the opponent. I think that's like peak, peak IBD culture, right? Is like knowing what road is like that. Mcdonald's has renovated, that bathroom's always clean. Great. Check this whitewash. It don't go there right? You just have the map in your mind like oh today I need to drop this way. Yeah. No my my go to is the home depot bolos, you know what's really clean at a home depot, the women's bathroom, you know there's a lot I got to get into.

I gotta get empty. Sometimes I go in the quote unquote hood right? And once you get there it's like the chevron and the mobile that's like the block like no bathroom on the outdoor. The key a key with the big thing on it. Yeah. Good ship. There's no nice grocery stores there. It's a food desert. I'm not gonna go shipping a beautiful public said they won't be there. There might be a home depot on the hood though. I'm gonna check and look into that. Yeah, because I work with contractors. Um Their offices are usually within the vicinity of a home depot or hardware store. I don't know why they could put their offices anywhere else, but most of the time they're within the vicinity of like contractor supply. So like you got a loan from. Yeah. And uh it's hardware that don't go to an ace. It is if you have, I don't have a helpful place and they're really small. Typically they're smaller. Oh yeah, we don't have his money down here.

No, no, you have to be the renovated one specifically. Wa wa you can't always count on them because that depends on the people. They're not always, not always there. That's a grocery store. Right? Wa was uh, it's a gas station that really started blowing up in florida. Like they built a bunch because people like their sandwiches and like they have like a sandwich section, whatever. Mac and cheese, blah blah blah 7 11. It's like a 7 11 subway plus gas station. Yeah. So funny. This reminds me of like a bunch of posts I've been seeing recently. Tell me your home health worker without telling me a home health worker knowing. Yeah, bathroom passwords at safeways, bonds. Gas stations. Yeah. Yeah. Starbucks isn't bad either because they don't bother you like, hey, do you have to place, you know, like, you know, you also have to know that like the place that would be like gatekeeping, their bathroom. I inherently have social anxiety. So I am like I, I still buy something like even when I go to the gas station, I was like, I'm all, I always buy something that way.

They can't that way they don't yell at me or I can't say anything to me be like, no, no, no. You see this coffee, let me in. Oh my God. For an extra two minutes if I go to Starbucks, I'm gonna get something because I'm a basic bitch, but it's a gas station. I don't care. What's the password? What's the password? Gotta go just in and out. What's the code? I don't even make eye contact. Like I know where it is. I'm just like door open. Boom, that's it. Good morning. Don't care sir. Don't care. Don't speak to me. I am a ghost. You do not see me. Yeah. That's uh brilliant. It's a vibe. Yeah. So are you actually allergic to anything? Mhm. Uh no, actually I think I am allergic to, I'm allergic to metal, so I don't wear any jewelry, like skin, like skin. So I got my experience when I was like eight. It was a nightmare, absolute like was allergic to the piercing metal, like my ears were infected for like a year and a half.

Um And even now if I wear like I have to wear like platinum if I wear anything like that, pure pure really expensive boujee ash. It is the only stuff that I can wear. Um and it got to a point where over the pandemic, I was like, I don't care enough about wearing earrings anymore. I've given up that. So I just let my ears close up. Oh they closed their actually closed for real. Yeah, like they are, there are, there are two things are weird, they never mind. Don't really close, it depends how long ago. Yeah, but mine were always, mine have always rejected the pierce. Like mine have never wanted to be pierced or extras accepted it. So they were probably, they were like, thank god. Finally just yeah, listen, get Out in 20 years. Okay. But what about to the touch cause metal and construction I make a difference.

No, I don't work with, I don't touch anything. I I work a pretty job I do. I show up and I'm like, hello and then I leave. I don't actually interact with any of you. Hello, what to do with this stuff but you don't do this stuff. Yeah exactly. That is I work in uh you know product onboarding and customer success for an augmented reality tech startup for construction. Um So I I absolutely do none of the work. I've never done any of the work. Have I had to work on construction sites. Yes. When I worked in construction project management, that's what I did. My office was a fake no, my office is a makeshift shanty town box in the basement of a big concrete structure where you're like and I could get murdered here. Cool.

Uh Like it and being like ah yes um there's nothing more fun than having IBD. I'm working on a construction site who porter buddy city like thankfully my first real job where I was like on a site for my entire day, my project manager, great guy still keep in touch with him. He's a good friend of mine and he talked to the general contractor because I worked for the plumber. So he talked to the general contractor that we were working for because we had built the general contractor, a nice off with running water and toilets, but that was only for the general contractor. No one else was allowed to use those bathrooms except for Monica. That's right. So these dudes in this other office would like, and they had like a couple of girls working for them but none of the other contractors had a woman working for them on site.

So it would just be me and I would like our office was on the third basement level and their office was on like the first basement level slash ground level. And so like every time I had to go to the bathroom I had to like run up several flights of stairs and then I'd be like here here and I was just like slink into this office, used the bat, like look around, make sure no one sees me and then I slink out and for the longest time I remember it wasn't until they went to, they saw me at the bar one day, like this company saw me at the bar across the street one day like hanging out. Um they were like, you seem nice. and I was like, thank thank thank you when they were like, oh no, you just, every time you're in our office, you look very angry and you just kind of walk in, you speak to no one. And then you and I was like, yeah, because I got, I got a job to do.

I'm not here for social hour here to use your bathroom and leave my office. I don't know you people are you alone? Like you take that same energy to the gas station, What's happening? What's going on? Right? Right there you go. You want the same a coffee. The gas station is scary off. For some reason. I'm always scared that the gasses would be like no. And then like pulled a shotgun on me if you like people leave now and I'm like, okay, it's not even real, what are you doing? It's a narrative in my mind that I have crafted. But if I don't buy something, the mean gas station man will just, he will smite me. I just can't do. They have signs outside the Lord. Uh some of them do. Yeah, like some of them and it's like, uh but especially in L. A. Right, Like, you know, try to keep homeless people out and stuff like that.

It's very like understanding which and like the policies change to like I remember going to a place where I had like previously just like walked in and use the bathroom and like two weeks later they were like customers only jesus and I was like here, yeah, I'm bought a Snickers bar, let me do your bathroom. Uh Yeah sometimes you know I haven't I don't know if they're doing this in like downtown L. A. Or just a central like larger cities, but we've had it a lot more in san Francisco where they're building very large, very nice porta potties where even the big door like, I don't know, it's just really nice. It has a sink inside free, they clean it every single day and that's just like a public, it's yeah and it's public because homelessness is really big in san Francisco as well, it's just you got to provide it for them where they're going to shoot on the ground, where else are they going to use the bathroom?

Yeah, we're just privacy. So I hope L. A just pick something up like that. I mean that would be a great reallocation of resources, but like how can we do that when the LAPD budget is how many billions of dollars? I mean it makes no sense. The homeless people keep shipping in our bathrooms give them bathrooms. No, well it's like them, it's a damn thing. If that was your aunt shipping on the street and you'd be like, oh that's not fair. But we've talked it like people are donating food water, but then also hand washing stations because all of a sudden they realized people got to wash their hands. Everybody not to mention them now, not to mention the women that need to like ovulate publicly, you know? Yeah folks, folks, men, straight guys, like that's a thing. Hello, We got a, there's a lot of moving parts there. How many moving parts? Yeah. Speaking of that, if your businesses all over the place where you like wrecked every time your cycle is on, then how does that work out with your symptoms?

Uh yeah, I just am sad. Like that was this past week. So I, I, because my anxiety gets so bad, but I'm on my period, it's worse now than it's been in a long time, but my period is like this like my the week before and like kind of right when my period starts, I go through this just like mega anxiety of like everything I've done is wrong, I'm going to get fired. I spiral and I like, I have to tell myself that it's just temporary like this, like you're not gonna get fired, not just, but I worked myself into this tizzy and then once my period like hits, I just, I go into like vegetable mode, like you can have a full conversation with me and I'll just like, and that's what I am. So this past week I've actually been off boarding the guy who works on my team because he's transferring teams.

And so like right now I am like so busy? I'm doing like five people's jobs right now? Like I need to hire because everyone knows anyone who works well and we're gonna dogmatic reality and construction in the uh dropped my handle anyway. So I've been offloading this guy who has his own set of customers and everything like that that I've been like you know overseeing but not day to day involved with. So essentially my to do list has just tripled in size. Yeah, Without any warning. And so like I get my period and it's like Okay no you need to be on site at this contractor. You like congrats, it's 85° in Los Angeles in October and you have to climb up five flights of scaffolding so that you can be on a construction site just bleeding. And also you have to be happy and bubbly and also you're cramping and you have, you feel like you have to shoot yourself but congrats you are up five levels of scaffolding like better hold it, hope it works out for you and hope you can make it to a bathroom at time.

Like it just um so it's one of those things that like on my period it's so much worse because you know you the ordinary woman has period poops when when everything crabs. And so it's just an extra fun like ooh! Additional pain. Is its stomach, is it Coleman, is it the uterus thing are we doing that? Is it? Um Like, so I just kind of like I had to tell my choreographic, listen, I'm gonna be doing all this stuff and like I just wanna let you know, I'm not here right now. Like you are. I am, I am the meat puppet of Monica but like here where we are checked out. I am like essentially my brain crashes after the anxiety that I have. Um and I just go from like here to just nosedive into the ground and I'm like, I'm just trying to get by like if I can just get through the day if I can just do sit at the desk and said my little emails like that's that's it.

Like I'm just trying to like scrape by um I hate that. That's like a double standard for women and management or people in management, people in construction. It's just like men are allowed to be grouchy, grumpy, quiet, silent, whatever the fuck. And they're seen as mysterious or caring about his work or leader versus the bitch. The bits would be resting bitch face that doesn't say hi to me. Like I'm just trying to use the bathroom. Yeah. Like I and I tell them I'm like, listen, if I don't do that, guess what? Every man and every man will on that side will be like, oh my gosh, hi. They all want to talk to me right? If I invite that They're like vampires if you invite them and they'll come in and stay and they'll suck you dry. Um And so I don't have time to have a conversation with every person I pass on a construction site or whatever. So um And like especially when I was working for actual construction companies like that was more my thing of like I'm minding my business, I'm here to do a job, this is my job, you are not talking to you, is that part of my job?

So leave me alone. Um And people be like oh she's so short. And so this and I'm like, do you want to have a uh do you want to talk to me at length because you have stuff to do to do. You wanna we can chat about. I can ask you about your feelings and they're like no I'm like okay then shut up leave me alone then. But now that I work in a customer setting, it's very much my my job is designed for a true extrovert and I am an introvert. Um So pete curren for me right now. Yeah. And so like this apple, this fun little apple watch that tracks my heart rate calories burned through the day on days where I'm with customers or I'm talking to customers. I hit my move goal. Even if I'm just sitting at my desk because it registers that my heart rate and my persona I am on. And so it just tracks that and like some days it will be like one p.m. And it's like you put your move goal for the day and I'm like, you know like I was saying like just for four hours talking to customers and so I haven't done anything but it's like hey congrats man, you have anxiety and your heart rate since you can work it out and you know that's like now I still have to be able to turn it on and when I am with customers and stuff it's like hey I am on this is it.

Um But I the fun code swishing of when I'm with my co workers. Um And even when they see me on calls with customers to like they could be on a call with me after that one and it will go from me being like, hey thank you so much reporting. Like I am so excited. Okay so this yeah like so this is what I have on deck for today. Did you have anything that you wanted to do? You have any questions at all? Um Okay well perfect. So I'm gonna send a follow up email and we're going to outline all this stuff and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Um And then I'll next call be like Don't send me an email. Don't like if the email has more than three lines, I won't respond to it. I don't care. What do you want, what you want. Is it this okay? Great, awesome. We have this call by like 10 minutes, whereas I'll talk to a customer for an hour. I will talk to people from my own company, like For 10 minutes to be like this okay, thank you. Thanks a lot. There's some jobs that are really not meant for us.

I don't know how you do that, I don't know how I'm like very, very carefully because I like, I genuinely love the work and I love what I get to do and when I'm out interacting with customers um and seeing you know the different breath of work that they do. Um but it's one of those things that like people have to like in my personal life, I have to tell people, I'm like no no no, I'm an introvert. So when I'm at work and you see this persona that I am and it's like, hey, like that's gonna it's gonna happy out. Let's do this, let's do that. That's me, that's me doing business. When I come home fucking leave me alone. Like we're sitting on the couch watching tv date. No, we're not In a favorite but we're not going out. You never come to happy hour with us. Never will. I just worked 10 or 12 hours. You've got, once I could pass this threshold, do not speak to me.

Yeah that's like no that's really quickly? Uh I just, I feel like this comes up a lot on our podcast. Is this topic on disclosure. And, and I love that you have it on your, you know, Tinder bio or whatever dating platform you're on right now and how openly you we talk about this like here today, but at work, that's, that's definitely a different um, you're working more by yourself or does it not matter in situations? So my last job, I lost the luxury of being able to hide it when I got hospitalized because yeah, they like straight up, it was like, oh, oh no, there's something wrong with Monica. And so at that point, I had to tell them to be like this, This is why I went to the hospital just to give them some more context of like, hey, by the way, the reason I went to the hospital, it's not like my appendix ruptured you, take out my appendix and I'm better.

I'm like, this is something that doesn't go away and I don't know how long it'll take for it to get under control to be better. And I said, so, you know, setting the expectation that it's not like, oh, I went to the doctor went to the hospital with a busted leg. They, you know, splinted and there I'm off. Yeah, there's, it's a whole lot of mystery and it's different every time. And it's not predictable. So I lost the luxury of being able to hide it at my job before that hidden. I barely even disclosed it to a partner I had who almost got, we almost got engaged. Um, and I never let him, I never really disclosed how bad my you see was when we were together. Um, yeah. Oh, nightmare. Is that what you said? It sounds like labor, labor. Oh yeah. Like that's too much effort. Well, there are days where you just don't want to fucking talk about it. Like let me just live. But the effort of making sure that they don't really see that part of your life is the labor.

I mean, yeah. And you know, they, it's the, I wish that like intuitive nature to see me struggle to be like, no. Like no baby. I'll take you to your doctor's appointment. Like I know I'll cook dinner like, no, It's like, why can't you see that? I'm struggling. It's like, no, no, no. I've done such a good job of living like this and making sure that no one sees it, that no one sees it. Um, And so at my current job when I started, I was still in a flare. I was changing my medication and but we were still working from home. But I did disclose because I was like, listen, here's the deal. We're still in a panda rosa. Mm hmm. And this pantomime. Yeah. Like this pen will say really be hidden. So I'm like, and I'm on immuno suppressants. Like, so I'm not, I'm not leaving the crib like until I feel safe and that was part of my conditions for hire is that my ceo talked to the investors and they were like, even if she has to work from home for a year because the pandemic is still bad and like vaccines like whatever that means like they were willing to be accommodating for me.

And when I was like, even within the first, you know, three weeks of me starting, I had to take days off. Um, and which I felt so bad. But here I am, I like I am miserable. I have to go to the doctor, I have to go do this, do that test results, you name it, um get blood work done. And so like I was taking days off after I just started and like they were like, okay. And I was like what do you mean? Okay. They're like you can't work unless you're healthy and you are the most like here are the things that are important in your life, you your family and your personal life and like down here is work. So focus on these two things and you are the most important thing. Focus on that. Like take as much time as you need to go to the doctor or whatever, Don't worry about it. Um take care of yourself. And so you know, I my co workers and that was a condition for me coming back into the office because my ceo knows I'm you know, on immuno suppressants.

Everyone in the office had to get vaccinated before he would even consider the conversation to be coming back in. That's awesome. And so like the understanding of, you know, also that like what the travel and what that means for me and you know, the kind of situations I'm willing to put myself into and situations I feel comfortable or like times I don't feel comfortable like one of my coworkers, uh anti vax and didn't respect my wishes to keep his mask on. When he went with me to a customer. I straight up told my ceo I was like, listen, we need to like this was not okay. Um as I say, who said, noted, like you make the call, tell him like then he's not allowed to go anywhere. Now, we're not having that discussion, we're putting our foot down. Um and this is what it is. Like we're gonna respect, you were going to respect your health, we're going to respect the help more customers, customers. Yeah.

Yeah. And we're like, this is this is the policies like this is not open for discussion. And so like, that's all you have actual support. Yeah. It it means a lot and I know a lot of people aren't as lucky and privileged to have people who understand. And even for me to, you know, say like even for me to get a box in the office on a thursday to be like, okay, I'm gonna have to go to my medication in the bathroom now where I'm going to have a mental breakdown because I'm afraid of needles and I don't like needles yet, I have to self inject this medication, so I'm gonna go cry in the bathroom, I'm gonna be back in like 30 minutes, Ok, sick. Um and they're like okay, yeah, and they like at this point I'm way more open about talking about my experience and I kind of sometimes I make light of it being like, God knew if I weren't shooting myself to death, I'd be too powerful, so he had to give me something.

Uh and that's like, you know, I I I make light of it, but it's you know my way of trying to integrate that and it's like instead of me compartmentalizing that part of my life, remembering you remembering that that's still a part of me that like I have to consider that part just as much as I consider the fact that I am black or that I am asian or that I am a woman like all these like that's still a part of me. Um and while it's not as like obviously not, it's not as obvious, but it's also not as like, like not to say rah rah rah is like black lives matter, right? Like listen people who have chronic illnesses and who are disabled are tired, they are on literal medicines to suppress their bodies. Like the idea that this community as a whole can continue to advocate for themselves and to do all that work themselves.

Like is it's a lot and like being in a position where I can talk about it and be like, because I consider myself not as bad and not to say that I don't have it. Like my experience should be minimized, but like I don't have it nearly as bad as some people do. Like. And so I have the ability and the energy to at least talk about it and to make people aware that this is a thing that people around them are dealing with and to be conscious of it in a way that, you know, they don't want to think about it. Like so that people don't want to think, no, I have a chronic illness that they don't, people don't want to be comfortable. It's for our brains, it's easier for our brains to not have to expand perspectives. You just keep on moving. Yeah. Well, and you don't look like the average disabled person what like you're too young to be your too cute you to this to be like, yeah, they have to unpack that and that is just too much.

Nobody aren't easy with that. And I asked that too because like, yeah, for one, there are accommodations needed, whether you're at home, you know, or in the office physically. But also let's normalize the ship out of this Today versus 10 years ago, probably would have been a little different. It's like, or pre pandemic, right? This whole work from home situation. Nobody has heard of it before. Covid, like we've been asking for this for such a long time. Yeah. And it's like, it congrats productivity didn't go down Like your capitalist contain people to monitor them, like the prison industrial system, like for no reason. Um so that I can what sit in a 68° office all day because they're a bunch of sweaty due to require it to be 68. My joints hurt when it gets below 74 in an office.

Like I don't need that, I don't need to be there. Like I can do the same thing without having a space time. Um Like it like the pandemic is great because it normal lot like, because it's something that like I wish I had been able to do like on mornings where I can't get like some days are better than others. Some days you get out of bed and you're like, I have all my spoons today sick and there's some days your alarm goes off and you go, oh God, I have 50% of the energy I need for the day, what am I going to do? And the fact that I can now say I can, I'm gonna take my first three meetings from home, come in in the afternoon or hey, I'll go do that thing in the morning, go to the customer and then I'm gonna work the rest of the day from home. Like before the jobs I was working granted, we're definitely more like desk type jobs because unfortunately construction project management, when you work on a construction project, it really helps to be on the construction project.

Um And so but like now is this thing of like even then there were days where it was not a requirement for me to be there physically, like it was forever every day that you have to be there just watching people or being watched by people like yeah and the yeah it's not that deep and I'd be like, hey I'm gonna like not to say I like abuse the system a little bit, but because I worked from the site and I worked from the office on occasion, sometimes people didn't keep tracking me on which location I was at. So some days people like the office, people would think I was outside the black people would think I was in the office. Um I was at home. Um So it's like just because it was like, hey my alarm went off at 5 45 this morning and my body said, yo can I have a sec And I said okay but and then it goes, you know, we really don't feel well you're like sorry, we're not, you need to be at work at 7 30 sorry you're not getting to work till nine like and that's three, that's just what it is some days and I wish it was more predictable to be like ah yes, on Mondays and Wednesdays, I have no energy on Tuesdays Thursdays.

Excite mystery. It's the super fun thing of not knowing what your life is going to be except mystery. Yeah. Whenever I have times that I have to actually be somewhere first thing in the morning for like a succession of days like that wrecks me, absolutely wrecks me. But I like this idea seems like a new idea that uh more and more bosses are losing that power and authority over their employees. I mean, you know rightfully so it's just We don't need to be stuck to a desk for 8-10 hours a day, for five days a week. You know, we're getting our managing and like staring someone down and look, you don't need a computer screen. Oh we got to block these websites like Candy gets their job done. Let them do the job and call it a day. That's less overhead. You should be happy. Yeah, no sense to me. We're getting the job done. Yeah. There's a lot of still making money. There's a lot of industries that are rushing back and not accommodating.

So it's great that your particular situation is working out because some folks are like funk. That pandemic nonsense. We back. I yeah my old company kind of felt like they did a situation like that and I was like, Oh God, I could not go from 100% work from home to just back. Like it's nothing happened. Like we are, we're just going to pretend that we write like it's easier. It's just easier for folks to, you know, let's just keep moving. Nothing ever happened Well. And also I accidentally said pre pandemic. We're not post pandemic. We're not, we know just before times and now times before time. Now that's it. There's nothing else. Yeah B. T. And nt Yeah. But anyways um is there anything that we did not quite discuss before we close out coming up on hour and a half. That's a lot of really good information.

I learned what you see was I learned what I. B. D. Was, I'm sure a lot of listeners are um you know, have some similarities but don't exactly understand no one that no one actually understands. We're all just making it up as we go. Um But yeah, I talked about, we talked about lifting at some point, right? I know this lifting is in the podcast. Um so uh yeah, I'll just Sprinkle the little tip it of how I like got into lifting. Um I was like the closer for the sure bring it, bring it back home. Uh But when I was in college my freshman year I decided to run cross country, disgusting. All the teams, all the teams will walk on teams. We were D three school. Um, and I was having body image issues and so the only thing I knew to do was like runners. Yeah, cardio as it turns out my body not equipped to run, just not for long distances, long, long distances.

Yeah, that cheated. Give me, we're not outrunning the cheetah, like I'm dead on the plains for sure. Um, and so I started running, uh, that was a false or in college, so we had to get to campus before school started for full term. Um, And so volleyball, women's volleyball is a sport that's also a fall sport. One of the seniors on that team, who I was like, man, that girl is really pretty and she's like hot. Like she also seems like a bad ass towards the end of cross country season. She sees me in like the locker room and it's like, hey, you should join women's water polo. I played women's water polo, join the team. She's like, we start practicing this day. four p.m. Bm. Pool deck. Yeah, I know how to swim. Sure. I've never heard of water polo. I the only, the only time I heard of water polo is when a family friend when I was in high school considered starting a water polo team at his school and the school asked how do, how do we get the horses in the pool.

Um, So that was my intro into water polo. What was not told to me and maybe I could have googled this shirt perhaps. Um and I've seen the men's team play during the fall season, but when we started practicing in the winter season, um, no one told me that water polo was like, if you mixed basketball with drowning nice. It's like, what can we do to make basketball more intense water in the water? Not to mention like the wrestling that happens underwater. Right? I hear y'all kick and scratch. Oh no, it's it's brutal. Okay, women's water polo, more violence. It's water polo because so the women, we wear these like high cut suits because the neck of the suit comes up to here and they're super tight. Like you when you buy your suit at the beginning of season, you like by your suit two sizes down because you are packed into this little suit like a sausage because you don't want people to be able to grab your suit off.

So the tighter it is on your body, the less people can pull it off of you, right? Um and they're also really high cut. So you've got a lot of like coochie lips fighting over the front of the suit, like, and you're but like there is no chance in hell that you're asked stays in the suit. That ship is up your, up your crack or over one thing or the other like it is. So here you are now now you have to play basketball underwater essentially. And it was hard. I it was very hard. We practiced for two hours a day, six days a week. We, one of my four seasons playing, we won a total of like three games ever. Um I scored eight goals goals total in my entire career. You can like, you can look me up, I'm pretty sure my bio and stats are still on the caltech website um for when I played, but it I I I loved it because it was like two hours a day where I didn't have to do anything other than like try to breathe and like work out like that was it, It was like you don't have to like you don't have to do physics, you don't have chemistry, you don't be sad over the fact that you're failing all your classes, here's the escape that you can do.

Um And guess what, you're also, you also get to be hot in town, awesome, love that. Um and so the senior, I was like, man, and then after that point I was like, well I can't quit. Um So I ended up playing all four years, I started my senior year, which was a rude awakening because I had never played a full quarter before. Um So water polo is divided into quarters, you know, you get your sort of timeouts or whatever, but I remember senior year, it was like our first game, I started four minutes in, I was gassed, I I'm not very good at water polo. I started because I was senior and like what decent but like in the grand scheme of water polo players I was bad and I it's like four minutes and I'm like coach like it's like he's like me out coach and he like looks and he's like now Monica hear a starter, you gotta play the full first quarter and I was like you can't do that just like what do you mean play the fool first quarter.

I've never played a full quarter of my life and he's like now you will have fun, go on and like it's just like just like wheezing the whole time because I played like the set position right in front of the goal where you put your like biggest most powerful offensive player, I am 56 and at the time 100 and £50. And the girls, some of the girls we were playing against were like it was like the casting call for Xena Warrior Princess, like these women were like 5, 11 glorious thighs, just beautiful, magnificent Amazonian women and I'm like I am a hobbit like that woman, she's going to overpower me, she's going to drown me, I do not stand a chance. The only thing I can do is be more violent um and so I was like I was really good at grabbing the bottom of the suit at the coochie level and just like dragging her up, wow that's like yeah so that's why you started lifting to be stronger since you're just not bigger.

And my senior who got me into her husband was powerless and so in the off season she would be in the gym with him and he'd just be like schlepping big weights and I was like uh and then I started dead lifting and very easily was able to dead lift like £185 like that and I was like oh this isn't hard so I can do that. Dead lift energy. Yeah so that's just what I stuck stuck with and then thought maybe after graduation I'll play directly for water call and I was like no no no I'm a power lift. There's a whole there's a whole community of people who just do this, it's a sport. It's real it's it's so you just filled in your two hours of just do something where I move. Yeah para lifting. Yeah that's great. That's my stuff. So so T. L. D. R. Monica. Why did you start lifting? So I could drag bitches that is it? I want to get better at the dragon, thank you for coming to my ted talk on how to drag pitches.

Yes, lift more weights, do the dead lifts grabbed by the coochie lips, That's it. two step process, real talk to women's water polo, I had no clue have some googling. This is some great, uh, late night I should be sleeping, but I'm gonna google something random right here. That, yeah, that's what I'll be doing tonight. Great. Thanks. Thanks for keeping me up. Um, well if someone happens to want to find you and they listen to this podcast that this bitches nuts. I love her. Where could they find you? They can find me on my instagram at Menlo. Um, that's M E N L O W. You can also find me on Tiktok at Monica and low no spaces. Just my name. Just that, that just seems like a reasonable thing to do is to associate my actual identity with my Tiktok profile. Um, so that's me. Um, I don't know to find me on linkedin. If you're looking for a job that's a boom drop the mic on that one.

That's where I exist. I love it sounds good. Disabled girls out girls out. Thanks for listening to disabled girls who left. We appreciate all of your support and everyone who's taken the time to show us some love. Don't forget to subscribe rate already. Review of our channel. We're on apple podcasts. Spotify player, FM, google podcasts and more. You can also find us on instagram at disabled girls who left