My "Kitten Days" - Juggling Chronic Illness & Creative Anxiety

I hope you feel better soon! My joy today (as it every day) is seeing what my son will learn today. He's 3 and super smart. He learns and thinks up new things every day. My other joy is the fact I get to go to my friends' wedding tomorrow. My gift is hand made coasters with pictures of them on them. My third joy today is silly but I'm really happy that yesterday the third dlc for Fallout 4 came out. It makes me happy to play that game.

I do hope you'll feel better. I have terrible social anxiety and on top of that I have sensory overload and depression, so all though I want to go outside and draw and just enjoy myself , I can't get myself to get out of my house even though I want to. I'm a digital artist so when I have days where my mental illnesses overtake my creativity, I just feel awful cause I hate being lazy. I find that since I'm an animal person , just taking care of my pets or studying animals makes my feel better. Let yourself have a break , although it may feel like your letting people down , you have to do what's best for yourself. Have a cup of tea, read a book, go outside and enjoy nature, do what makes you happiest, but doesn't stress you out.

I wanted to say that it means so much to me that some of my videos could help you and I'm feeling blessed to be able to hear you talk about it! I relate so much to many of the things you mentioned and I think it's so powerful to be a little vulnerable and let people in on what you're going through. It just ups everyone's self-compassion a little bit and makes us feel less alone. So much love and many blessings to you ♥

Youre so hardworking, a break sometimes is okay. I used to wonder how you could take care of all of your plants and animals and youtube and life but i realize you are super hardworking and i admire that

I like that..."Kitten Days"...it really is a good way to think of days when your chronic health issues are rearing their ugly head.  I SO had to share it with my mom, and she likes it too :)  Hoping that you have no kitten days on the Ann Arbor trip!Three joyfull things for today...I woke up shortly after midnight to my cat giving half my face some kisses; on the way to work, I got to compliment a lady who lives in a house I pass everyday about the gorgeous flowers in her yard; and I found some super cute clipart for a sign I created for a book cart at work that is going hold a bunch of books for a summer storytime group, including clipart of Paddington Bear reading a book, which is SO perfect for the group, since we love to read those books :)Thanks for sharing the kitten cam!

Seri I just wanted to say when I read your replies to comments I love how you always use exclamation points! it makes everything fun and exciting and actually kinda gets me in a better mood!!

I'm so truly sorry that someone as amazing as you has to suffer with this, Seri. No one deserves an illness, especially one so crippling. I hate to admit it, but every time the topic of it comes up I always get a bit emotional, as it really hits home with what a dearly loved family member of mine is suffering terribly with.  Maybe I'm just too sensitive, haha. It's really hard to deal with, especially when every passing day I'm witnessing his memories and his strength slowly fade away and I know there's nothing I can do for him...but your positive attitude towards it all, especially when you're suffering from a chronic illness yourself, helps more than you could ever know. I'm honestly not sure where I'd be if I didn't have your wonderful influences to rely on these days, so thank you! =)

I understand about the discouragement about dialing things back. I have been dealing with foot & back pain and hypothyroidism issues for about 1 & a 1/2 years. It frustrates me at times that I can't do what I use to do. I worked very very hard to lose weight about four years ago and over the past 18 months I have gained most of it back. Some due to thyroid, some due to meds used to treat my back, a lot due to inactivity because I just did not have the energy! I am determined to get healthy & fit, but first have to work on healing my foot & strengthening my back. Realizing that I needed to step backwards with my exercise routine was discouraging. Going from walking 3 to 5 miles a day down to 1 mile every other day was hard! I have to take things in baby steps. If I overdo one day, it can set me back for days!! I am thankful for the wonderful loving family I have, for a precious sweet old kitty and for a patio full of happy hummingbirds feeding at my feeders! Lol

I wonder if you could do something like... Seri's Silent Sick Days? Where you record yourself doing something relaxing, and upload without any talking. Some quiet little game, or maybe coloring in one of those adult coloring books. :)

Its so beautiful

Oh, I do have a joyful thing to share (It's sort of sad too because it means my life has to change SO MUCH OH MY GOSH). So, backstory- For a long long long time (like since I was 13 or 14) I have believed that I had some sort of Lactose Intolerance, and maybe more recently IBS. I've been to doctors to try and figure it out, and they would give me different diets to do, and no matter what, I always ended up with the same problems... Randomly, no matter what kind of food I was eating- I would have horrible, terrible stomach issues. It was like playing Russian Roulette with my food. I avoided Dairy (though couldn't keep away from chocolate I COULDN'T STOP MYSELF. IT'S MY INNER CHIPS.), I would never order anything new at Restaurants, and in fact I would rarely feel like eating out anywhere or in fact eating at all. I started to cringe any time I got hungry because I knew I'd have to spin that wheel of chance with my food and see if it would make me sick or not. I could eat a sandwich one day and be fine, and two days later have the same thing and be horribly sick for an hour afterward. Then, I actually got sick. Not bad, just a bit of a sinus cold... but I wanted to get better- FAST. So I cut out everything but water to drink, and stuck to nothing but chicken soup and crackers for about three days... I got better. I started eating other food again... and the moment I had a soda- I got sick again! So I experimented... and I read labels... and I googled... and I think I have finally, finally, FINALLY figured out what all those doctors couldn't come up with. I HAVE FRUCTOSE MALABSORBTION, SERI. I'm not lactose intolerant AT ALL. The past week I have had cream cheese and milk in cereal and hot chocolate, and chocolate milk (and I know you're Vegan, I'm sorry but OH MY GOSH I CAN HAVE MILK AGAIN). It means I have to cut soda out of my life almost completely- and avoid lots of different fruits and be SUPER CAREFUL about what kind of foods I eat... BUT I FIGURED IT OUT! It's been a full week now and I haven't been sick ONCE after eating!! It's almost strange not to feel apprehensive about food! And thankfully, with a bit of extra glucose in my diet- I should be perfectly good to go! <3 I am so so so so happy to figure it out! Even though it means life will change drastically- I will hopefully never again deal with being afraid to eat. :)

I'm graduating college tomorrow. (BA in English woot woot!) I'm not really sure what i'm going to do with that degree yet. But it means i've graduated three times now (High school in 2010 and I also got a two year general studies degree from my local community college in...2013.) By birthday is next month (i'll be 24) and one of my friends reminded me that that means i've made it a whole nother year so that's really good :D. And lastly you inspired me to go out and get a whole bunch of bird photos yesterday :D. I sat out in my yard yesterday evening for like two hours and took a bunch of photos. It was really cool to see how close the birds got to me when I was trying to be super quiet and not move too quickly.

I watched the latest episode of steven universe and it was amazing!

I know how you feel Seri, Im young and I cant run for long periods of tome without coughing and taking a rest. Dont overdew it seri, It doesn't do good for any of us.