Tag Archives: FSD

Recommended Reading for 28 October 2010

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Readers beware! Not every link is a guaranteed trip to a safe space, and the commentary is not necessarily the opinions of myself or others here at FWD/Forward, but have been included to provide you with a variety of reading that is possibly relevant to your interests (or perhaps to mine). The comments in the blog posts or mainstream news articles you will find below may or may not be triggering to various -isms, and so I would caution you, gentle readers, to proceed with the greatest of caution as you click through away from this page.

Yahoo! News: Nurse error left man brain-damaged

Mr Merrett was aware of the mistake that had been made before he lost consciousness, unable to speak. He can be heard on the film urgently clicking his tongue as a warning.

Ms Aylward tried to resuscitate him but it took 21 minutes for the machine to be restarted by paramedics, leaving Mr Merrett with serious brain damage. He had been nursed at home since 2002 after a road accident left him paralysed from the neck down.

In a strange land (sent in by reader Deborah Russell): The slow reveal

That’s one of the things I like about this book. It doesn’t try to pretend that illness is easy, that everyone can just take the pills and be happy. Kate de Goldi’s characters cope, but there are costs for each of them too. Above all, there are costs for Francie. She has found a way of living, a way of managing, a way of being… content, even if not happy per se. But there are costs. Fancie is no super-crip. She’s just an ordinary woman, who copes as best she can with the way her life has turned out.

The Living Artist (sent in by Heather Freeman): Withdrawal

I see my doctor once a month for a new prescription, because she won’t give me one with refills. (To be honest, I’m unclear if this is her policy, the hospital’s policy, or state law. My impression is that it’s the hospital.)

Last month the one person in her office who knows how to work the computer was out, so I had to have my husband call in to make my next appointment. By the time he got through to the office (which is incrediblyhard to reach by phone) their next available appointment was 6 weeks after the last one. He pointed out that I would run out of my medication before then, and they said they’d see what they could do. Of course we then heard nothing.

Feminists with FSD (sent in by reader Astrid): In defense of “Dysfunction”

Since I have FSD, I have vested interest in learning more about it – what it is, what treatments are or aren’t available, how it impacts individuals’ lives (if at all,) etc. It’s not just reading though – I’ve talked to and received feedback from women who themselves have FSD in one or more forms. I’m especially interested in how FSD is perceived and what people say about it! It’s meta, and its fascinating. So what are people saying about it? When I read about FSD, I notice a few familiar themes pop up repeatedly…

HealthCanal.com: Controversial Law Improves Care for Serious Mental Illness

Currently 45 states have involuntary outpatient commitment laws, but only a handful are designed with prevention in mind. Kendra’s Law is intended to identify and address at-risk behavior that may trigger the need for hospitalization.

Amid criticism that the law may violate patient rights by mandating treatment, the New York State Office of Mental Health commissioned an independent evaluation of the implementation and effectiveness of the program.

Gentle Readers! Always feel free to send your links for a Recommended Reading to recreading [at] disabledfeminists [dot] com. Be sure to include how you would like to be credited for your great find, and a link to any website you want affiliated with yourself.

Recommended Reading for December 7

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Disability & Poverty

People with disabilities, the report says, account for a larger share of those experiencing poverty than people in all other minority, ethnic and racial groups combined and are even a larger group than single parents.

The extra costs associated with living with a disability such as purchasing expensive equipment like wheelchairs and catheters or obtaining specialized medical attention keep many disabled people and their families in poverty, the report notes.

Autism Speaks Hits A New Low

Before I explain what they’ve done to make me say that, I have to provide a bit of background information. You see, back in early August, Autism Speaks sent out this press release encouraging people to submit videos of autistic individuals for use in an upcoming film project. This project had huge names behind it— most notably, award-winning movie director Alfonso Cuarón, the man behind both Children of Men and the third Harry Potter movie— and was to be titled “I Am Autism.” According to Autism Speaks co-founder Suzanne Wright, this project was intended to “shine a bright spotlight on autism,” and was to be unveiled at the United Nations World focus on Autism on September 22.

Seems pretty harmless, right? “I Am Autism.” Sounds like it might be some sort of “We Are The World”-type production, about how we’re all affected by autism in some way. And “shining a bright spotlight”? I actually had a small gleam of hope that Autism Speaks was finally shedding their doom-and-gloom message for something more positive.

Well…

Diagnosis of a Faun

Determined outsider triumphs over mainstream medical, using a disabled artist as her protege/experiment. If not dance as therapy, the therapeutic effects of dance. Those are the storylines here; not Mr. Mozgala or even the piece itself — which, btw, I hope to see in June if not in December. So, here, we go.

Mozgala does not gain much space in the article except as a medical project with a weird gait: his CP has “caused him to walk for most of his life like ‘a human velociraptor,’ as he put it: up on his toes, lower extremities turned in, seesawing from side to side to maintain balance.” In fact, we don’t hear much about his acting career; he’s more of a specimen. Once, we’ve got the details of an enslaving CP out the way; the whole thing starts out with an outside: a choreographer who has done with with nontraditional dancers (my phrase) — the article’s author, Neil Genzlinger says “outside normal dance parameters. She sees Mozgala and is “inspired.” Yeah. That thing.

My Experiences with Vulvodynia

On the other hand, I found the medicalisation of my sex life difficult to deal with – in the end, I was dreading trying to have sex, and tried to only do so the weekend before an appointment because I knew that a doctor was about to ask how it was. I dread to think what the reaction would have been if I had admitted to seeking treatment for this condition while single; there was no opening for the possibility of non-straightness or non-monogamy. It wasn’t until I saw the final doctor, a sex counsellor, that anyone asked whether my relationship was good; even then, the focus was on returning me to a fit state to have penetrative sex and babies. (When I finally took a deep breath and said, “I don’t think I want to go on with this, I have no motivation to cause myself pain every day,” the counsellor replied that other women often went through with it because they were trying to have children. Fair play to them, but she didn’t ask whether I wanted children.)

In the news:
Ambulance Unable to find place for suicidal girl

A mentally ill, suicidal teenager was ferried around for hours by an ambulance crew because no NHS unit would accept her, the BBC has learnt .

The girl eventually had to be taken to a police cell, documents revealed under the Freedom of Information Act show.

Recommended Reading for October 28

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Join Marlee Matlin in Demanding Captioning of Online Video Content

Academy-Award-winning actress Marlee Matlin has been using her Twitter account to actively lobby for captioning of all the digital video content that is flooding onto the Web. The issue has rightfully hit a boiling point for the deaf community because Netflix and other services are now streaming video online without captions.

The National Association of the Deaf sent a letter to Netflix Oct. 5 complaining about the lack of captioning for “The Wizard of Oz,” which was available for download free at the Netflix Web site as a promotion.

Matlin points out the irony of a recent video about the Helen Keller statue unveiling at the U.S. Capitol on the CNN Web site that has no captions!

Related: How to add Subtitles and Translations to your Vids, Captioning Sucks!.

Ableism in 30 Rock [Includes an embedded video from HULU that is not available outside of the US]:

A lot of feminists love 30 Rock. As they should: it’s a funny show, and a rarity for television – a women-fueled enterprise with a two main female characters, written and conceived of by a woman. That is Cool, full stop. And 30 Rock has many deft explorations of the many facets of being a white, middle-class, straight, woman with able privilege. But persons with disabilities don’t fare quite as well.

30 Rock trades on ableism on an almost episodic basis. The show’s disrespect towards folks with disabilites, particularly those with visible disabilities, is constant and unrelenting from side gags to b-plots to regular characters. 30 Rock constantly places bodies with able privilege in a position of supremacy above bodies with visible disabilities through humiliation and devaluation. Its abuse of persons with disabilities in the name of comedy goes beyond the casual ableist language like “lame” or “retarded”. Such language is unfortunately ubiquitous to even shows that have been critical of ableism (eg, The Office has critiqued ableism through Michael Scott’s typical obliviousness on a couple of occasions, but, as in life, “lame” and occasionally “retarded” is still a consistent presence) but 30 Rock’s ableism is constant, humiliating, and dehumanizing.

An Example of an Article about FSD [FSD = Female Sexual Disfunction]

I’m still not fully understanding the claim that FSD is profitable. If that’s the case, why is it so difficult for me, someone who falls into the pain category, to find a doctor who is equipped to handle me? My experience is that often, my first line of defense doctors get tired of seeing me after I don’t respond to conventional treatments. I think right now my local gyno probably never wants to see me again.

The article goes on to talk about hysteria. For the most part I don’t find this section of the article to be inherently problematic. Except for the part about “pelvic congestion,” being in quotes, since it is mentioned as a real thing in Heal Pelvic Pain (p. 16)

Identifing:

But the real reason it followed me and stayed there in the back of my mind was the times I thought, “Wait. That’s me.” And then my guilt complexes came in full-force, telling me no, you can’t call yourself that, that’s for people with real problems, any problem you have is just in your head. And maybe most of them are in my head, but well, it doesn’t make them any less real. It doesn’t make it any less hard to me to function or to try and figure out how to fit into society. It doesn’t make my very concrete limitations disappear.

In the news:

Clem7 Tunnel Labeled a death trap for the disabled [Australia]:

BRISBANE’S Clem7 tunnel could be a death trap for the aged and infirm, a disability group has warned.

Queensland’s Spinal Injuries Association said the 4.8km-long tunnel’s emergency exits were too far apart and too narrow for people with mobility problems to escape an underground disaster.

…

Mr Mayo argues there are no design rules for tunnels but believes this infrastructure should follow the Australian Building Code which mandates emergency exits at every 60m in buildings.