Content Note: chronic illness, severe pain, medical frustration, emotional distress
Welcome to the Cryptid Dispatch
Welcome to The Crippled Cryptid.
Disability, chronic illness, service dogs, and survival without the performance.
If you’re new here, hi. I’m Sky.
Professional cryptid. Unwilling amateur cyborg.
Occasional chronic illness and disability advocate.
Medically complex enough to make my chart a jump scare.
I cope with sarcasm, snacks, and narrating my life like it’s a field report.
Sometimes, there’s even coffee.
Those are the best days.
But today, we’re coping with lemon iced tea.
Which is still pretty good.
Most days are lived in a haunted meat suit with a questionable warranty and a long-standing feud with my nervous system.
And on Tuesdays… we document it.
The appointments.
The adventures.
The spirals.
The “we left the house and now we have a story” moments.
Sometimes that story is just me in a waiting room, mentally drafting a rant while staring at outdated magazines.
Sometimes it’s “we found a place after and the food was life-changing.”
Sometimes it’s a thrift store adventure after an appointment.
Sometimes it’s both.
The Party Members
I spend a lot of time in Bed Jail™, but when I do venture out into the wild, I’m rarely alone.
There’s Luna Bean.
Medical alert service dog. Guardian. Enforcer. Service Dingo™.
Public access professional. Emergency “we need to sit down right now” decision-maker.
The one who can go from sweet to Mumther, absolutely not the second my body starts acting up.
There’s also M&M.
My Player 2. My soft place to land.
Co-adventurer. Passenger Princess. Map-keeper. Snack provider.
The one who makes sure we actually eat after appointments, keeps me grounded, and occasionally helps turn a rough day into something softer.
And, in spirit (and usually at home), the Yard Yeti.
Keeper of the home base. Guardian of the Wi-Fi.
Professional “I support you from this chair” energy.
But also responsible for some truly elite tater tots and 3am grilled cheese.
What This Space Is (And Isn’t)
This space is for chronic illness without inspiration porn.
Disability without apologies.
Life as it actually happens… including the messy, the mundane, and the unexpectedly good.
If you’ve been here before, welcome back.
If you’re new, you’ll find your footing.
Welcome to the Cryptid Dispatch.
Field notes from the chaos.
This Week’s Mission: Failed “Be a Person” Attempt
Cryptid Dispatch incoming: today’s report includes life updates, possible ranting, questionable decisions, and whatever adventure we stumbled into… intentionally or not.
The intention for this week was simple:
Try to act like a person again.
- Get out of bed before noon.
- Make phone calls.
- Find a new care team.
Full disclosure?
At the time of writing this… none of that has happened.
If anything, I feel further away from being a person than I did a few days ago.
And yeah. That sucks.
The Boss Fight: Thunderclap Headache
On Sunday, I had a thunderclap headache that knocked me flat on my ass.
I won’t even lie about it.
What I didn’t say then, because it still feels unreal, is that I’m still dealing with the aftermath.
Days later.
I’ve only had a handful of these in my life, and I don’t remember them lingering like this.
This one settled in and refused to leave.
At some point between 2 and 3am this morning, I finally asked M&M for one of the heavy-duty pain meds.
Because after a whole weekend of trying to suck it up and deal, your ghoul just could not take the pain anymore.
I tried Tylenol. I tried Nurtec. I tried everything else first.
Nothing helped.
And if you can’t tell, your ghoul doesn’t like taking heavy-duty pain meds.
Especially not these.
The ones I save.
The ones for that level of pain.
The kind that reshapes your entire night around survival.
And that’s been the pattern.
Pain that doesn’t just hurt, but takes up space.
The kind that keeps you awake.
The kind that turns your own body into something you have to endure instead of live in.
Small Escapes
The only relief I’ve been able to find is slipping upstairs for a couple hours in the morning.
Letting M&M sleep.
Watching the birds on the deck.
Trying to write.
The sunlight feels like a blade some days, but it’s still better than lying in the dark trying not to make noise while everything hurts.
Because when it gets that bad, Luna tries to fix it.
She climbs me like a tree.
Shifts. Adjusts. Checks.
Because that’s her job.
And I’m not going to punish her for doing it.
So instead, I relocate.
Laptop. Notebook. A little pocket of quiet.
And I try to think straight.
Do I always succeed? No.
Sometimes it’s just me sitting here playing stupid mobile games on my phone.
Or watching the robins eat.
Both look like survival.
The Side Quest: Finding Care
I did try to call doctors.
I really did.
And I ran straight into the same wall I always do.
“Have you tried XYZ?”
Yes.
Yes, I have.
Caffeine changes. Medications. Physical therapy.
All of it.
And then comes the part that never quite stops stinging:
“You’re a complex case.”
As if I didn’t already know that.
As if I haven’t been living in this body the entire time.
The suggestion is always the same.
Go somewhere bigger.
Go somewhere far away.
Try places like the Mayo Clinic or Johns Hopkins Hospital.
And sure. That would probably help.
But can I realistically do that?
Travel. Hotels. Expenses. Logistics.
No.
So instead, I sit there.
I stay polite.
I hang up.
Give myself a few minutes to cry.
And then I call the next name on my list.
The Small Good Thing
Today, it was 42 degrees.
The sun came out.
And I was able to open the dog door for a little while.
Which meant Luna got to go in and out like the tiny sunflower-powered cryptid she is 🌻
Until the neighbors let their dogs out.
They don’t have a fence.
They don’t supervise.
Their dogs bark, rush the fence, and wander.
So, for Luna’s safety, she doesn’t get outside time when they’re out.
And honestly, I hate that.
Because I feel like I’m punishing her for their poor decision-making skills. And that fucking sucks.
It’s gotten to the point where the police once showed up asking if those dogs were ours after they were found near the highway.
They are not.
Ours was inside.
Working.
Because I was in a flare and she wouldn’t leave me.
Because that’s who Luna Bean is, when she knows I’m not feeling well, I’m the only place she wants to be.
The Place You Don’t Leave
Sometimes I think about leaving.
Getting out of Illinois.
Going somewhere quieter.
More space. Better neighbors. Lower taxes.
Maybe even better odds of cryptid sightings.
But I don’t think I ever will.
Because Bear is here.
Buried in the yard.
And this is the house I grew up in.
Some places aren’t just places.
They’re anchors.
Even when you dream about drifting.
Do you have a place like that?
If you do, you’re allowed to feel both things at once.
The wanting to leave, and the knowing you won’t.
Field Status 🧭
HP: Critically low but operational
Mana (spoons): unstable, flickering
Active Effects: pain flare, light sensitivity, emotional damage
Current Quest: find a doctor who doesn’t fear complexity
Side Quest: drink water. maybe eat something. survive the week
Luna Rating 🐾
Alert Level: 🔴 High
Nap Quality: 2/10 (kept waking up to monitor Mumther)
Interventions: Frequent. Uninvited. Deeply committed.
Overall Assessment: “Something is wrong and I will simply not relax about it.”
Final Notes from the Field
Some days feel like side quests you didn’t sign up for.
Like being dropped into a game of DnD with a character you didn’t build.
Or being trapped in Jumanji and no one told you the rules before you picked up the dice.
Some days are big.
Some days are just “we survived the appointment.”
Some days are just:
we survived the body.
we survived Bed Jail™.
And all of it counts.
Every single bit of it.
Tomorrow might not be better.
But it will be different.
And sometimes, that’s enough.
End of report. The cryptid survives another day.
Thanks for being here.
Love you, now say it back.
-Sky
© The Crippled Cryptid
Disability. Honesty. A little chaos.
(Occasionally field-tested.)
🔗 https://linktr.ee/skylanarissa
There’s never pressure to donate. Reading, sharing, or simply staying is more than enough.
If you’d like to support the long, slow work of staying alive, stable, and still wandering when I can:
💜 https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-skys-journey-to-health-and-mobility
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