Content Notes / Trigger Warnings
Medical trauma, seizures, healthcare gaslighting, chronic illness, MCAS reactions, medication side effects, emotional distress, brief mention of family conflict, illness/cold symptoms.
Welcome Back to the Cryptid’s Den
This is The Crippled Cryptid.
A soft-lit corner of the internet where disability, chronic illness, service dogs, and everyday survival magic gather like familiar spirits who know when to sit quietly and when to laugh too loud.
If you’re new here, hi. I’m Sky.
Professional cryptid.
Unwilling amateur cyborg.
Medically interesting enough to make half my providers sigh when they open my chart. I sigh too. Often. Loudly.
And today, I probably ask for Tylenol.
I live in a haunted meat suit with a deeply suspicious warranty. I spend a lot of time in Bed Jail™. I am almost never alone thanks to my medical alert service dog, Luna. She is part guardian, part shadow, part stern little voice that says, “Excuse me, Mama. Sit your ass down. Right now.”
And of course, there’s M&M. Never far. Always there with the 90 percent when I only have 10 to give. Even when she’s sick. Even when she has to take Buckley’s, which tastes like absolute shit but works. The commercials say so. They are not lying. The first time I took it, I screamed.
Robitussin doesn’t have a thing on Buckley’s.
This space has always been about showing up for ourselves even when our bodies refuse to cooperate.
Chronic illness without inspiration porn.
Disability without apologies.
Love without pretending it’s easy.
Returning cryptids, welcome home.
New cryptids, pull up a chair.
Welcome to the Lunatic Café. The Den is big enough for all of us.
On Today’s Menu: A Saturday Weekly Health Update
Have you ever told yourself it’s just one of those days, and tomorrow will be better?
I’ve been telling myself that all week.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t a bad day. This was a bad week.
And sometimes weeks don’t end with lessons learned, strength gained, or a tidy little bow. Sometimes they just end. That doesn’t mean you failed.
It means you survived something that didn’t come with a resolution.
Luna would insist that is important.
Monday: When the Foundation Cracks
Monday began with an Uber driver who was pleasant enough but would not stay off his phone. He missed the turn to my allergy and asthma office twice. Nearly caused an accident. There are multiple routes. He missed all of them.
If you can’t tell, I’m not Uber’s biggest fan.
I’d love to tell you I had Luna with me for what came next. I didn’t.
This is one of those offices that refuses to allow her inside. It doesn’t matter what the ADA says. It doesn’t matter that allergies are not a legally valid reason to deny a service dog. It doesn’t matter that they know my history or that Luna is trained to detect my seizures.
They just don’t care.
What they also didn’t bother to mention when they insisted I come in for my Xolair, timing matters, and I’d already missed December due to severe Keppra side effects, was that the office had been renovating.
A brand new waiting room.
Fresh paint everywhere.
Chemical smells throughout the hall.
All known MCAS triggers.
All things I was there because of.
When I walked in dizzy and disoriented and said it smelled like paint, they tried to gaslight both me and M&M. Told us they couldn’t smell anything. Said it wasn’t paint.
There were fresh paint signs everywhere.
The walls were still dripping.
This is what medical gaslighting looks like.
For the first time since I was 18, I genuinely wanted to change offices. It didn’t feel safe. It didn’t feel familiar. It didn’t feel like a place that knew me.
So, instead of getting back into another Uber, at least right away, we walked. Almost two miles. Pokémon Go open. Legs screaming. But it was in the 50s, warm enough to breathe, and in January in Illinois, that’s basically a miracle.
We found an Asian buffet. We went thrifting.
Nightgowns were acquired.
The Yard Yeti scored pajama pants. Luna got a new collar.
Grief and thrift-store wins in the same afternoon.
This is what living in a sick body looks like.
Small victories still count.
In my world they have to.
Tuesday: The Body Speaks
I can’t tell you if this is where the cold started.
If we caught it walking, at the thrift store, or the allergist’s office.
I can tell you I had another seizure.
There’s already a post about that one. The kind where I tried not to name the family member who hurt me. The kind where someone implied I was using my health to dodge responsibility.
That’s not who I am. If this were something I could control, I would. I don’t enjoy seizures. I don’t enjoy scheduling three-day EEGs where electrodes get glued to my scalp like new hardware updates that I don’t want.
For the record, that’s February 6th. (I got the call on Thursday.)
I wouldn’t be fighting with the hospital about contrast I’m allergic to for a CT on the 21st. Same day as my heart PET scan.
My life would look different.
My life would look easier.
A simple cold wouldn’t knock me flat on my face for weeks.
But my brother Matthew came over to have game night with my little brother, and I grilled pork chops on the Blackstone. Something that I love doing. Being able to use my grill in winter- having a screened in porch for it, is still something I take pride in. And that too, is important.
Wednesday: Side Effects and Silence
Wednesday wasn’t better.
Neurology hadn’t called like they were supposed to. Again. When I finally reached them, they allowed me to reduce Keppra to once a day after I listed the side effects stacking up:
• Constant exhaustion without sleep
• Nightmares I don’t remember but wake up wrecked from- the kind that disturb both Luna and M&M.
• Dizziness
• No appetite, M&M and the Yard Yeti both heckling me to eat constantly otherwise I won’t.
• Headaches despite migraine meds. Constant ones that not even rescue meds help with.
• Constant nausea
Keppra has not been kind to me. Neither has this office.
It was colder. My mood dropped. Everything hurt.
Luna’s toebeans? Not impressed.
Thursday: Cold Outside, Cold Inside
Snow arrived. Luna took one look at the world, tucked her tail, and said, “No thank you, mumther. I will not be tinkling today.”
The sniffles started to make themselves known. Whether this was the medication adjustment, the weather, or a full-blown cold was unclear. What was clear was that stacking illness on top of side effects is brutal.
I planned to grill taco meat.
I pivoted to frozen pizzas from Costco. No one was mad. Who could be mad about pizza?
Sometimes survival looks like changing the plan without guilt.
Matthew came over again for games with BJ, the Yard Yeti.
Luna decided that maybe Matthew has gotten a promotion, maybe he deserves a nickname now that he’s important enough to bring toys to and play with.
Friday and Saturday: Bed Jail™ on Purpose
By Friday morning, the plague had fully arrived. M&M and I both sick. Snow, sleet, cold rain outside. Chicken noodle soup. Crackers.
Bed Jail™ was declared.
Not because nothing was happening, but because rest was the most caring choice available. Sometimes rest isn’t recovery. Sometimes it’s harm reduction.
Luna has been on high alert for both of us. Not anxious. Not frantic. Just steady.
She’s taken up her rightful place between us on the heated blanket, all forty-something pounds of her pressed right into the middle like a living boundary line. One mama on each side. No negotiations. Snuggles are also mandatory.
She moves between us like she’s counting breaths. Checks in. Repositions. Watches. When one of us shifts, she’s already there. When vitals wobble, she notices before I do. Before M&M’s FitBit, before my Apple Watch. This is what she was born for.
This is the part of service dog work people don’t picture. Not the dramatic moments, but the quiet ones. The ones where nothing happens because she’s paying attention.
It’s hard to explain what it does to your nervous system to be this sick and still feel safe. But that safety has a name. And she answers to it.
We watched The Black Phone 2. I waited a long time for it. It was good. Tame, frankly, especially after Final Destination: Bloodlines. Still four stars.
We also started Hijacked with Idris Elba and talked to the TV loudly because we demand answers.
Nearly two years in, Luna is less chaos, more anchor. Unless she wants to play and you don’t. Then she will absolutely remind you that joy is also medicine.
Closing the Week
This week was heavy.
If you’re stalled, sick, unresolved, or filing today under soup, saltines, and silence, you’re not doing it wrong. Weeks like this still count. Staying counts.
Love you. Now say it back.
-Sky
© The Crippled Cryptid
Disability, honesty, and a little chaos.
If you’re here, you belong here.
If today was heavy, thank you for carrying it with me.
If you’re reading from Bed Jail™, give your service dog an extra scritch for me.
🔗 https://linktr.ee/skylanarissa
There’s never pressure to donate. Reading, sharing, or simply staying is more than enough.
But if you’d like to support my ongoing journey toward health, stability, and mobility, you can do so here:
💜 https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-skys-journey-to-health-and-mobility
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